

Class ?Z 3 
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COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT. 








The King of Nobody’s Island 


BY 


THOMAS ENRIGHT 



Copyright 1909 

THE GIBSON PUBLISHING COMPANY 
NEW YORK 


All Rights Reserved 


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Cli.it, (O 5 fv 
JUl 12 1909 


CONTENTS 


Chapter p age 

I. The Millionaire 1 

II. The Little Deal 11 

III. Dog Eat Dog 20 

IV. The Mocker 33 

V. The Start 39 

VI. The Map Maker 58 

VII. Harrison's Lake 65 

VIII. The New Nobility 78 

IX. While the Road Was Mending 89 

X. The King Starts for His Kingdom 102 

XI. Nobody's Island 113 

XII. A Warning 118 

XIII. The Spring Gun 123 

XIV. The Man in the Woods 130 

XV. The Valley of the Shadow 139 

XVI. A Problem 147 

XVII. The Mother's Blood 159 

XVIII. The King Holds Council With Himself 163 

XIX. Two Old Gray Rats 167 

XX. The Game 175 

XXL Dog Eat Dog Again 180 

XXII. The Messenger 190 

XXIII. The Home Trail 200 



































THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 





THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND. 


CHAPTER I. 

The Millionaire. 

John Douglass stood in the doorway of the 
Chicago Board of Trade, deep in reflection. 
The tumult which had surged and swelled in 
that Temple of Mammon through the day had 
died away; the place was deserted now, save 
for a few laborers and a little army of clerks, 
or perhaps here and there a white-faced man 
sitting alone at his desk wondering how he 
could face -the future. 

For Douglass the day had been a gratifying 
one. He had just completed a most satisfac- 
tory campaign in wheat; he had “cleaned up,” 
— bought in the last bushel of his short line, 
and what had been paper profits before, were 
now secure and tangible. 

A million dollars — that had been his mark, 
and he had reached it. He had been a gambler 
all his life, with alternating periods of success 
and failure ; but failure had never made a 
coward of him, and he returned to every new 
battle bolder than before, realizing shrewdly 
that caution is a thing for a gambler to exer- 
cise only when he is a winner. 


2 


THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


Douglass had always told himself that a 
million was enough, that when he reached that 
golden goal he would leave business, with all 
its perplexities and cares, behind him. He 
smiled now at the fervor of that vow. He 
knew that there was nothing else in the world 
for him but business, and no business but 
speculation. Well he knew the hazards of the 
game, knew that he possessed ample means 
to gratify all his tastes and desires, knew that 
his fortune might be swept away again; but 
realizing all this clearly he knew that to- 
morrow, — the day after, he would again enter 
the lists. 

He was no money lover, this thin, pale-faced 
man of the world; he valued money for what 
it would buy; he wanted enough to gratify his 
expensive tastes; but beyond all, he wanted 
the game. He wanted money for the sake of 
making it. He played wheat as he played 
whist, boldly, intelligently, and he loved to win. 

The man realized as he stood there that he 
was not at all the ideal millionaire : he owned 
no real estate, he had no large business in- 
terests ; everything he had was money, or 
bonds and shares which he could convert into 
cash on an hour’s notice. He kept no stable, 
no mansion, and only one servant; he did not 
care for any of those things. He lived alone, 
to take his pleasures where he might find 


THE MILLIONAIRE 


3 


them, and they were becoming more and more 
difficult to find. Even now he was wonder- 
ing what lethe he could find tonight, all the 
old dissipations had grown stale. With a diffi- 
dent nature, always mistaken for an arrogant 
one, he craved companionship, yet made few 
friends. In speech and action he was calm, 
almost cold — (an exterior which all gamesters 
possess) — though he burned always with an 
unquenchable fire of nervousness; but the fire 
was banked — always banked. He drank deeply, 
and was one of those dangerous drunkards 
who are never noticeably drunk. He lived on 
excitement and whiskey, yet no man had ever 
seen him excited or drunk. 

He revolved in his mind the possibilities of 
the evening; if he went to the club some man 
he did not like would talk to him on a subject 
he cared nothing about, or Buller would want 
to sell him real estate which he did not want 
to buy. The theatre had long ago been placed 
among the impossibilities, and as for a social 
call — that was as bad as the theatre, too much 
that was uninteresting, and too much time 
between drinks. Women did not enter into 
his calculations ; he knew that he was no 
favorite with the sex; his money and liberality 
would buy favors of course, but the thought 
that he himself was of no consequence had 
long ago sickened him of these liaisons. 


4 


THE KING OF NOBODY'S ISLAND 


There was nothing for it but to wander 
about from one old haunt to another, chat 
with an acquaintance here and there — and 
drink. Perhaps an inspiration would come. 

He crossed the street leisurely, and entering 
a handsome barroom seated himself in one of 
the little upholstered recesses that lined the 
side of the room. An attendant brought a 
decanter and a glass without an order — Doug- 
lass always drank the same thing, straight 
whiskey. 

As he drank, he looked about the room and 
nodded to one or two men — no one there with 
whom he cared to hob-nob. There was 
Howard with his side-whiskers and his insuf- 
ferable English accent, and Porter, who talked 
horse forever, and Beardsley, who had read 
Burns to the exclusion of all other poets, and 
who would quote “Holy Willie’s Prayer” at 
the sixth glass, and “Tam O’Shanter” at the 
tenth, pausing between verses to explain the 
meaning of the lines; and Morton, who had 
made two millions in stocks, and who talked 
not at all, and Cramer, who was always going 
broke and always giving other people advice. 

No one worth while but Morton, and that 
individual sat, fat and phlegmatic, with a gob- 
let half full of brandy before him, making wet 
rings on the table with the bottom of his glass 
and never looking up from his absorbing task. 


THE MILLIONAIRE 


5 


Cramer rose at last and walked toward 
Douglass. 

“Hello, Douglass,” he said, “what’s the good 
word ?” 

Douglass greeted him politely; he was never 
rude to any one, but he groaned inwardly. 

“Nothing new,” he answered ; “will you have 
a drink?” 

Cramer seated himself and Douglass rang 
for another glass. 

“How do you feel on wheat now,” Cramer 
asked. 

“I’m out of the market, cleaned up today. 
I don’t know what to think; it’s about low 
enough, but I wouldn’t want to buy it.” 

“I tell you it’s going a good deal lower,” 
Cramer said ; “it’ll go to fifty cents.” 

“Why, I thought you were bullish.” 

“So I was; I bought the stuff from ninety- 
five down, but I’ve switched. I’m a bear now. 
You must have made a lot of money on this 
break.” 

“Yes, I did.” 

“Well, let me tell you, old man, you hang 
on to it. If I ever get what you’ve got 
they’ll never get it away from me.” 

Douglass was angry, but made no reply. 
This man belonged to the class who can 
always tell a man what to do, but cannot 
accomplish anything themselves. It irritated 


6 


THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


Douglass that he should assume that he did 
not know how to take care of himself. 

“If you ever let them get it away from you,” 
Cramer pursued, “well, you ought to lose it.” 

“Where would you stop if you were to make 
a lot of money,” Douglass asked. 

“Um — well, give me a hundred thousand, 
and no one will ever get me.” 

“You’re talking nonsense, no man ever 
stops; when he gets a hundred thousand he 
wants a million, and so on forever; you had a 
hundred thousand twice, and you didn’t stop.” 

“I know, but I will the next time.” 

“No you won’t; it simply looks big to you 
from the present point of view. When I 
started trading with next door to nothing, I 
said that when I made twenty thousand I 
would quit; I made it and lost it trying to 
make fifty thousand. I got another start and 
made fifty thousand, and lost it trying to make 
it an even hundred. Now I’ve got a million 
and I might lose that. Of course, I don’t 
think so, but I might.” 

Morton, glancing up from his geometrical 
studies, caught Douglass’ eye and nodded. 
Then he rose heavily and crossed to him. He 
looked at Cramer coldly and gave him a barely 
perceptible recognition. 

“Douglass,” he said, “want to speak with 
you a minute before you go.” 


THE MILLIONAIRE 


7 


Cramer rose hastily and bade them good- 
night, and Morton wedged himself, ponder- 
ously, into the vacant seat. 

“You got out of your wheat today,” he said 
inquiringly. 

“Yes, I’m out of the market.” 

“Well, you’re wise, it’s anybody’s market 
now.” 

“I suppose you got out, too; I saw your 
men buying.” 

“Yes, I didn’t have much of a line. I do 
better in stocks. I’m going in on a deal with 
Bruce next week; it’s a big thing, and about 
as near a cinch as anything speculative can be.” 

Douglass pricked up his ears; Bruce was a 
great manipulator in New York. What was 
Morton leading up to? Something certainly; 
he never multiplied words needlessly. 

The big man mused for a moment, making 
the interminable rings on the wet table with 
the foot of his glass, then he said slowly: 

“Tell you what I’ll do, Douglass, I’ll put you 
in on this if you like. We want another 
man ; we are going to form a pool of two and a 
half million dollars, four of us, Bruce, Green, 
Hadley and myself. W e are going to let Bruce 
work the thing in a certain stock.” 

Douglass said nothing; he did not ask what 
stock. He knew little of Wall Street, but he 
understood the ethics of the game. 


8 


THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


“It’s not exactly a blind pool/' Morton con- 
tinued. “We each agree to take up a lot of 
the certificates to create a scarcity; we hold 
those shares with the understanding that no 
one sells until the word is given, so we all get 
an equal chance. The cash shares will absorb 
half the pool money, and Bruce operates on 
margin with the balance.” 

The two men sat silent for a time. Doug- 
lass was flattered. He had always been alone 
before, and this was the first time he had been 
considered by one of the big men. At length 
he said: 

‘Til consider the matter, and give you an 
answer tomorrow.” 

“All right. Of course, I can’t enter into de- 
tails now, but you know who the men in the 
pool are, and who Bruce is.” 

“Yes. I’ll call at your office at three o’clock 
tomorrow.” 

“Very well, good- night,” and extricating 
himself with difficulty from the space between 
the table and the seat, Morton walked away, 
leaving the little table covered with an elab- 
orate net-work of wet rings. 

For a few minutes Douglass sat thinking of 
the interview, then he rose and left the 
barroom. 

He walked slowly north on La Salle Street 
and entered the Stock Exchange. In the cor- 


THE MILLIONAIRE 


9 


ridor a tall, clear-eyed man of about forty-five 
accosted him : 

“Hello, Doug, looking for me?” 

“Hello, Billy Matthews; no, thank heaven; 
you lawyers are always smelling trouble. I’m 
glad to see you, though, Billy, it’s been an age.” 

“Not my fault, come over to the house this 
evening.” 

“Not tonight, Billy, I’m tired; I don’t feel 
very chipper lately.” 

“You don’t look well.” The lawyer’s eyes 
were shrewdly taking in the thin face, the list- 
less droop of the shoulders, and the blue rings 
about the eyes. “You need rest, Doug, need 
it bad.” 

“Do you know, Billy, as much as I love you, 
I always feel a bitter resentment toward you 
when I meet you — you always criticize me.” 

Matthews looked surprised. 

“I don’t mean in words,” Douglass contin- 
ued, “but I can feel it. You don’t deny it.” 

“It isn’t criticism ; I can’t see an old friend 
wearing himself out without thinking about it. 
This speculation and late hours — ” 

“And whiskey,” Douglass added dryly ; 
“don’t forget the whiskey.” 

“Yes, that’s bad, too — it’s burning the candle 
at both ends, and there’s nothing in it.” 

Douglass smiled, “Many men of many 
minds,” he said. 


10 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


“No, we’re all pretty much alike; I lived on 
my nerves for years just as you are doing now 
— they were bad years, lost years.” 

“And then you quit drinking, and you went 
out into the woods and fished and hunted and 
made pictures and found new things under the 
sun and realized that there were lots of things 
in the world bigger than a ten-dollar bill,” 
quoted Douglass, smilingly. 

Matthews laughed. “You’ve got it down 
pat, but you try it once; get away from busi- 
ness, go into the woods, rest a month, two 
months; then come back and laugh at me if 
you like.” 

“Why, Billy, I’d die in a week; I’d go crazy 
in two days. If I’m left without some kind of 
occupation for an hour I’m unhappy ; that 
wouldn’t do for me.” 

“Try it sometime; it isn’t lonesome in the 
woods and hills; a city is the most lonesome 
spot on earth, sometimes.” 

Douglass smiled as Matthews walked away. 
“Dear old boy, but visionary as the devil,” he 
said to himself. 

At the entrance Matthews turned and looked 
back as his friend walked slowly along the 
corridor and turned into the bar. 

“A good brain and a good heart,” he mused, 
“too bad, too bad; but he’ll find himself some 
day — if he lives.” 


CHAPTER II. 


The Little Deal. 

Douglass awoke the next morning, heavy- 
eyed and sick ; twice he sat up on the side of 
the bed, only to lie down again and try to 
sleep, but the active brain would not rest, and 
with a final determined effort he arose and 
walked at once to a small buffet that stood 
in the room. He cursed softly when he found 
the decanter empty ; he remembered now that 
he had finished its contents the night before. 
All other entertainment failing him, he had 
come home early with a new book, and seat- 
ing himself, with the decanter on the table 
beside him, had read and drank until the page 
blurred before him, and the decanter was 
empty. 

There is no time when a man who lives on 
liquor wants his drink so badly as when he 
first rises. Douglass rang his bell sharply, and 
almost before its echo had died away, rang it 
again. His servant appeared with the bottle 
ready in his hand 1 — he knew how to interpret 
the bell. Feverishly, Douglass poured a full 
glass of the whiskey and drank it quickly, then 
another. He was sick, sick — scarcely able to 


2 


12 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


stand — but he had been sick for years. He 
knew the disease and the cure. He walked 
about the room for a few moments. Slowly 
the color stole into his cheeks, his hands ceased 
trembling, and the awful feeling of sinking and 
depression left him. Then he took a third 
drink, a smaller one, and entered his bath. 

He dressed himself with the scrupulous care 
for which he was noted, and when he left his 
apartments he was as much himself as a man 
who lives on stimulants ever is. Downstairs 
he entered the cafe, and seating himself at a 
table, opened his newspaper. Breakfast, with 
him, was a mere concession to old habits and 
conventions. Sometimes he ate a few bites, 
usually nothing at all. On this particular 
morning he nibbled a bit of toast, sipped a 
little coffee, and then rose and walked into the 
street. 

He looked at his watch — ten o’clock. What 
in the world should he do until three, the hour 
of his appointment with Morton? He had a 
little business with his brokers and at the 
bank — that would occupy him for an hour; 
what then? He walked down State Street anid 
gazed' without interest into the windows; he 
smiled as he recalled that years ago he had 
often stood before these windows and dreamed 
of what he would buy if he could afford it. 
Now he wished there was something that he 


THE LITTLE DEAL 


13 


could wish to buy. But no, his million re- 
posed in the bank, lifeless, impotent dollars, 
mere counters in the great game of beggar 
my neighbor. 

At Madison Street he paused to listen to an 
altercation between a blustering policeman and 
a frightened Italian boy who was vending 
plaster casts, 

“If I ever catch ye on this street again I’ll 
break every one of them imidges,” the police- 
man said, and the boy murmured some- 
thing in a scared, dazed way, but did not 
offer to move. 

The policeman raised his club menacingly. 

“You break one of those things and you’ll 
be off this beat tomorrow,” Douglass said in 
his crisp, incisive way ; “don’t you see that the 
boy don’t understand?” 

The policeman turned red with rage. “And 
who are ye?” he said. 

“Never mind who I am — let the boy alone; 
he’s a stranger in a strange land; he’s got a 
living to make and he’s trying to make it.” 

“I’m half a mind to take ye in yerself.” 

“All right, go ahead.” 

The officer glared at him, thought better of 
it, and moved away. 

Douglass felt in his pocket and brought out 
a bill, ten dollars ; he handed it to the boy and 
was gratified at the look of amazed, concen- 


14 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


trated joy on his face. Tears came into the 
big, dark eyes ; then followed a burst of voluble 
Italian. Douglass moved hurriedly away; he 
abominated emotion. 

At noon he visited his brokers and his 
banker, and after some brief transactions, 
started his aimless wandering again. He chat- 
ted with a few acquaintances, watched the 
ticker for a few minutes, gave a boy a dollar 
for feeding a great, gaunt mastiff that was 
sniffling pathetically at a butcher’s cart, and 
then went back to the ticker. 

But even the ticker has little interest for the 
man who is out of the market, and the time 
dragged heavily. 

At last three o’clock came and he walked 
toward Morton’s office. He had decided to 
enter the pool. He had thought the matter 
over and understood it now about as well as 
he expected to after the details were laid 
before him. He did not know what stock was 
to be manipulated, he did not care — he wanted 
to be doing something, and he wanted to be 
one of the insiders. As to the prospects of 
success, he knew that Bruce was a shrewd 
manipulator, and that Morton always had 
the best of a deal before he entered it. At any 
rate he felt unbounded confidence in his own 
ability to take care of himself. He had no feel- 
ing that placing half his fortune on the ven- 


THE LITTLE DEAL 


IS 


ture was a very important matter ; he was used 
to taking chances. 

The big man was seated at the desk in his 
private office. The floor around him was lit- 
tered with bits of matches; he was nervous, 
but in such a phlegmatic way that no one 
noticed it. He looked down after he greeted 
Douglass and went on breaking matches into 
bits with his fat, powerful fingers. 

After a few brief commonplaces Douglass 
took a check from his pocket and laid it on 
the desk. 

“I’m coming in with you,” he said. 

■Morton took the check and looked at it in 
his dull, heavy way, turned it over and looked 
at the back, started to fold it, but thought 
better of it and laid it down again. 

“You understand, Douglass, I’m vouching 
for you in this matter. We have to exercise 
great care in such a deal. It’s of necessity a 
gentleman’s agreement; our success depends 
on good faith all around.” 

Douglass made no reply; he did not propose 
to cheapen himself by any assertions as to his 
own integrity. 

After a few more matches had been broken, 
Morton went on : 

“I’ve followed you pretty close, closer than 
you know, and I think you’re going to make a 
good addition to our ranks. Here are the de- 


16 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


tails, look them over; if you want to with- 
draw after you have read them, we’ll tear up 
the check and I’ll take your word for it that 
you won’t let it leak.” 

Douglass was pleased at this evidence of 
confidence; he did not know that Morton, dull 
and prosy as he appeared, was a past master 
in the art of flattery. Nor did he know that 
the big man felt sure that there was no remote 
chance of his withdrawing now. 

He read the closely written pages, penned in 
Bruce’s own cramped hand for surer secrecy. 

Briefly, the plan was this : The National 
Rope Company, a- little trust with only ten 
millions of capital stock, had, a year ago; listed 
its shares in Wall Street. These shares had 
been speculative footballs, with many ups and 
downs. As the stock paid dividends, a great 
deal of it was held by small investors. The 
present price was low, about fifty dollars a 
share. Bruce explained that he would buy 
outright about thirty-five or forty thousand 
shares, which would exhaust the floating sup- 
ply of stock, or at least create a scarcity of 
Street certificates. These shares he would 
divide among the members of the pool, pro- 
rata, with the understanding that they were 
to be locked up and kept out of the Street 
until the word was given to sell, then all would 
fare alike, as each man would have an equal 


THE LITTLE DEAL 


17 


opportunity to dispose of his shares in the 
open market. Meanwhile the manipulator 
would “milk the market,” bidding the price up 
to high figures and reaping profits on the way 
up. A million and a quarter would pay for 
the floating shares, the other million and ai 
quarter would be the manipulator's working 
capital. He would first accumulate a big line 
carefully, and then good reports of the busi- 
ness of the National Rope Company would 
begin to fill the financial columns of the daily 
press; perhaps an extra dividend would be 
paid; he could arrange all that. 

Douglass read the letter carefully and un- 
derstandingly. It was simple enough and 
pretty certain. He passed it back to Morton. 

“It’s all satisfactory,” he said briefly; “I’m 
in.” 

Morton folded the check and put it in his 
pocket-book. A half-million-dollar deal in 
Wall Street does not involve so much detail 
as in other lines of business. 

“I’ll keep you posted,” he said. 

“How high does he intend to put it?” asked 
Douglass. 

“High as he can ; I don’t know, he probably 
don’t know himself. He’ll break the price first 
to get his stock cheap and create a short 
interest.” 

“Of course; what’s the stock really worth?” 


18 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


Morton reflected, tearing a sheet of paper 
into little fragments — the matches had given 
out. 

“Well,” he said at length, “to tell the truth, 
it aint worth a damn. They’ll be assessed in- 
side of a year, but that don’t make much 
difference.” 

“No, I suppose not.” 

The little deal having been arranged, they 
went together to the barroom where they had 
met the night before and ratified the alliance 
with a drink or two. Then they separated and 
went each his listless way. 

In his rooms that night Douglass sat down 
again to his bottle and his book. He told him- 
self that merely following the movements of 
National Rope was likely to prove a trifle 
tame; he would have liked it better if he had 
had an active part in the work. But the deal was 
made, no use objecting now to its conditions. 
So he strove to dismiss the matter from his 
mind, and turned again to his story. 

But he could not read tonight with the keen 
appreciation and quick understanding which 
ill-health and excesses had failed to conquer. A 
project was forming in his mind; as it took 
shape, he let his thoughts wander from his 
book until he realized with a smile that he 
had read a dozen pages with no knowledge of 


THE LITTLE DEAL 


19 


what they contained. Then he laid the volume 
aside and began pacing the floor. 

“Of course,” he said to himself, “why not 
get in the game. I’ll keep my promises, but 
I’ll start a little Rope deal of my own and 
make a killing.” 


CHAPTER III. 


Dog Eat Dog. 

Although he was under no injunction as to 
speculating in National Rope for his own ac- 
count, Douglass knew enough about the 
machinery of the Street to realize that his own 
operations, if large, would interfere with 
Bruce’s campaign. So he decided to go slow 
and keep his own counsel. 

His plan was simple enough : he would 
watch for the preliminary break and buy a 
line of National Rope on margin. Bruce was 
to report daily to Morton what he had done, 
and by following these advices he would try 
to deduce what would probably be done next. 
On this plan he would himself buy and sell 
under cover of his broker’s name, and the 
transactions could not so easily be traced to 
their actual source. Meanwhile he watched 
the ticker and waited. 

He did not have long to wait; a few days 
after the formation of the pool, a statement 
appeared in all the daily papers that the Na- 
tional Rope Trust was to have a powerful 
competitor, and that their business would 
probably be cut in two. Still later it was 


20 


DOG EAT DOG 


21 


hinted that the next quarterly statement of the 
corporation would make a bad showing. The 
news also went abroad that Bruce was a bear 
on the shares and was selling heavily. Un- 
der these influences, and the savage, well- 
timed attacks on the stock by the manipulator, 
the price fell rapidly to fifty, then to forty-five, 
and a week later was quoted at forty. 

At this latter price Douglass bought five 
thousand shares ; he shrewdly surmised that 
Bruce would not go too far, he would not want 
to frighten too many actual holders out and 
bring a fresh supply of floating stock into the 
market. Speculators were already talking 
pessimistically about the future of National 
Rope, and this was just what Bruce wanted, a 
short interest which he could squeeze. Doug- 
lass realized that the desired pessimistic senti- 
ment had been created. 

The price remained around forty for a day 
or two, then broke sharply to thirty-eight and 
immediately began going up. That day the 
closing price was forty-two. Two days later 
Morton delivered to Douglass certificates for 
six thousand shares of the stock. They were 
what is known as Street certificates ; that is, 
they were signed in blank by the original pur- 
chaser in such a way as to make them the 
property of the holder. Douglass took the 
stock to his deposit vault and locked it up. 


22 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


The next day he bought five thousand more 
National Rope on margin. He was positive 
now that the deal was on; he could only 
theorize before, for in his daily reports Bruce 
confined himself to statements of what he had 
done ; he never told what he intended doing. 

Slowly the price, of National Rope advanced; 
all the reports of formidable competition and 
poor business were authoritatively denied; the 
president of the company personally stated 
that business had never been so good, and that 
it was highly probable that the dividend rate 
would be raised at the next directors’ meet- 
ing. The same people who had been predict- 
ing that the stock would sell at ten dollars a 
share a few weeks before, were now talking 
one hundred. 

When the price reached fifty-two, Douglass 
sold his ten thousand shares, having realized a 
profit of over a hundred thousand dollars. He 
sold on the theory that Bruce would probably 
take profits soon. But the price kept on ad- 
vancing until sixty was reached. 

Douglass was dissatisfied ; he told himself 
that he had played the game like an amateur. 
He might have known that Bruce was not out 
for ten or twenty points, and besides, he had 
gone in too cautiously. He should have 
bought twice as much as he did. He was satis- 
fied now that there was to be a further ad- 


DOG EAT DOG 


23 


vance, so he re-purchased his ten thousand 
shares and an additional ten thousand. In an- 
other week seventy was reached; then came a 
break to sixty-five. The next day Bruce re- 
ported that he had sold out with a quarter of 
a million profit to the pool. He explained 
that he had attracted too many short-margined 
followers, and had “shaken them out” to clear 
the atmosphere. 

Douglass studied the matter carefully; it 
was certain that the game was not over. Bruce 
had said nothing about a division of the profits, 
nor had he given the word to sell the cash 
holdings. There was to be a still further 
advance. 

Convinced of this, Douglass doubled his 
line ; he now had forty thousand shares. Every 
“point” up or down meant forty-thousand dol- 
lars now, and in addition to his speculative 
line he held six thousand shares in certificates 
— he was in with a vengeance. The price ad- 
vanced to seventy and again dropped to sixty- 
five. Douglass began to get a little nervous ; 
he knew he was overdoing it, and decided to 
reduce his line on the next upturn. 

At ten o’clock one morning he went to Mor- 
ton’s office; the big man was not there, — his 
clerk stated that he had gone out for a moment 
and Douglass entered his private office and 
sat down to await his return. He noticed a 


24 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


telegraph blank lying on the floor, and reach- 
ing to pick it up and lay it on the desk, his 
eye caught the signature “Bruce.” He read 
the message quickly and rose and left the room. 
He went straight to his brokers and gave an 
order to sell his National Rope. He was per- 
plexed : the telegram to Morton read, “You 
have been selling out your certificates; unless 
you assure me that your line is intact by buy- 
ing six thousand shares at once, will declare 
pool disbanded and sell everything.” 

Douglass felt sure that Morton had gone out 
to follow this dictum to buy the six thousand 
shares, but if he had not, and Bruce kept his 
word, there would be a crash. He was not 
greatly worried, for he felt that his stock 
would be disposed of around the average buy- 
ing price at least. He stood for a few moments 
watching the ticker; National Rope was com- 
ing out in small lots at sixty-five. Then he 
determined to find out what Morton had 
done, and went quickly across the street 
and called for a clerk in the office of Morton’s 
broker. 

“Hill,” he said, “I want you to meet me in 
the Rathskeller, in the third wine room from 
the door, right away.” 

“All right,” was the response, and Douglass 
made his way quickly to the appointed meet- 
ing place. 


DOG EAT DOG 


25 


He had hardly seated himself before Hill 
appeared. The clerk was a shrewd-looking, 
sharp-eyed youth. Douglass did not waste any 
words; he took a hundred-dollar bill from his 
vest pocket and shoved it across the table. He 
had done business with the boy before. 

“Hill,” he said tersely, “I want you to go 
right back to the office and find out what 
orders Morton gave this morning, and ’phone 
me here at once.” 

The clerk took the bill, folded it and placed 
it in his pocket coolly. 

“I don’t need to ’phone you,” he said; “I 
took Morton’s order myself. He has been in 
the office only once this morning, and he gave 
an order to buy six thousand Rope.” 

“All right; that’s all. You’d better go first. 
What was Rope when you left?” 

“Sixty-four and a half.” 

“Thanks.” 

After the young man left the room Douglass 
sat for a few minutes revolving in his nimble 
brain the events of the morning, and trying 
to decide what would happen. The thing looked 
all right on the face of it ; Morton had tried to 
slip out of his certificates quietly, and Bruce 
had in some way discovered it and issued a 
prompt and practical edict. So far, so good; 
but Douglass didn’t like this kind of thing, — a 
fight among the members of the pool. He was 


26 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


oppressed with a sense of impending disaster. 

He rose and made his way quickly to his 
office. He drew the tape through his fingers 
and started with surprise : Rope was forty-six. 
The stock was pouring out in big blocks, and 
the ticker was dancing madly. He watched it 
for a moment : forty-five and a half, forty-five, 
a thousand shares at forty-four and three-quar- 
ters. A boy ran in with a telegram. Douglass 
tore it open hurriedly : “Pool disbanded, bad 
faith among the members. Am selling hold- 
ings, sell your certificates. — Bruce.” 

Reaching to the telephone, Douglass rang 
up his brokers quickly: “Sell six thousand 
shares Rope at the market; I’ll bring you the 
certificates in a few minutes. What did you 
get for my forty thousand?” 

“All kinds of prices, everybody trying to sell 
at once. It will average you about fifty-one. 
Just finished selling.” 

Douglass walked to the bank deliberately. 
There was no need to hurry now. He esti- 
mated his losses as he walked along, — at least 
half a million. He had been badly beaten, and 
it was a bitter pill to swallow. He decided 
that he would say nothing until he heard what 
Bruce had to say. 

He took the certificates from his box and 
carried them to his broker. That individual 
received them joyfully; he believed Douglass 


DOG EAT DOG 


27 


to be good for anything he did, but in the 
speculative arena no one is ever sure of a 
man’s solvency. 

“What did you get for these?” Douglass 
asked. 

The broker laid a slip with a list of prices 
before him, “All the way from forty-two to 
thirty-five.” 

Douglass made some brief computations on 
the slip: “All right,” he said, “that will leave 
me a balance with you, I’ll call for it to- 
morrow.” 

He crossed the street to the barroom where 
the National Rope deal had been formulated. 
Morton was sitting in one of the recesses mak- 
ing rings on the table; he beckoned to Doug- 
lass. 

“This turns out badly,” he said; “we will 
lose about a hundred thousand apiece, I guess. 
The last report Bruce made shows that he 
had a big line long. 

“He accuses some one of bad faith.” 

“Yes, so he says,” Morton said, always look- 
ing down at his fret-work. “Sorry I got you 
into this. You can stand it, I guess. It’s the 
fortunes of war.” 

Douglass made a brief reply and moved away. 
He did not care to tell Morton that he had read 
his message; neither did he care to speak of 
his independent operations. He would wait. 


3 


28 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


The next morning he received a statement 
and a check from Bruce; a brief letter accom- 
panied the documents stating that he had 
thought best to disband the pool and sell its 
holdings. There had been a very savage raid 
on National Rope, and he had found it unsafe 
to proceed further, so had sold the pool’s hold- 
ings in the open market as per statement in- 
closed. Nothing about Morton. 

The statement was a long one, covering 
several sheets of paper. It showed that the 
pool had suffered a net loss of something over 
half a million dollars. Douglass’ personal 
share of this was therefore about one hundred 
thousand. In the cash certificates he had lost 
very little, but his independent transactions 
had cost him four hundred thousand dollars, — 
half a million gone in less than a month. 

He was not a man to spend either time or 
words in useless protest. After his first 
bad quarter of an hour he had taken the matter 
philosophically. But neither was he a man 
to slight the details of the affair. He wanted 
to understand it. 

He went to his office and examined the state- 
ment carefully. Bruce had not begun selling 
until the price had reached fifty. Then he laid 
the statement aside and lighted a cigar, leaned 
back in his chair, put his feet on the table, and 
for two hours did not move except to light one 


DOG EAT DOG 


29 


cigar at the butt of another. Then he rose 
and called for the official tape of the day be- 
fore. The tape is the long white ribbon on 
which the ticker prints the record of every 
transaction made on the Stock Exchange, the 
number of shares, the price, and the time of 
day- He drew the ribbon carefully through 
his fingers, a little at a time, and made memo- 
randa of the dealings in National Rope until 
he had covered the transactions of the entire 
day. He folded the sheets which he had 
covered with figures, and put them in his 
pocket. Then he lay back in his chair and 
smoked three more cigars. 

“Crooked,” he muttered at last; “crooked as 
a grape vine. I don’t suppose I can make the 
old fox disgorge, but I can go to New York 
and let him know that I’m on to his little 
game, and I will go.” 

Two days later Douglass was in New York. 
He went at once to Bruce’s Wall Street office, 
and sent his card in to that worthy. After a 
long delay he was ushered into the private 
office. The only occupant of the room was a 
short, heavy man sitting at a huge desk writ- 
ing. He did not look up as Douglass entered, 
but went on with his work. Douglass seated 
himself near the desk and scrutinized the man 
closely, undisturbed by his lack of courtesy. 


30 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 

He noted that his features were stern and for- 
bidding, and that he had a most remarkably 
ugly mouth ; it was simply a straight slit, — no 
sign of lips, no curve. Douglass remembered 
that he had once seen a Western gambler with 
a mouth like this, and had heard that he would 
kill a man and consider it all in the day’s work. 

His writing concluded, Bruce turned slowly 
in his chair and fixed his cold, gray eyes on 
Douglass. Not a sign of an expression ap- 
peared on his heavy face. 

“Well,” he said. 

Douglass knew that here was a man to 
overawe people, to make them ill at ease by 
his brevity of speech and glowering harshness. 
But he was neither overawed nor ill at ease. 
He returned the look in kind, and said : 

“I want to understand more about this Na- 
tional Rope deal.” 

“You had my letter and statement !” 

“I did, and I saw your telegram to Morton 
also. You ordered him to buy six thousand 
shares of Rope* He bought it at sixty-five.” 

“Well?” 

“You sold him yours.” 

A shade of surprise crossed the manipula- 
tor’s face, — it was enough, Douglass knew that 
he was right. 

“Well, suppose I did? He broke faith, and 
deserved what he got.” 


DOG EAT DOG 


31 


“That part of it is all right; it was a clever 
trick, but look here.” Douglass drew the 
sheets of figures he had compiled from the 
tape out of his pocket and threw them on the 
desk. “Morton bought his six thousand at 
sixty-five; there were sixty thousand shares 
of Rope sold between that price and fifty. You 
didn’t begin selling for the pool until fifty was 
reached. I want to know who sold that sixty 
thousand shares between sixty-five and fifty.” 

“You sold part of it,” Bruce answered com- 
posedly. 

“Yes, I sold less than ten thousand shares 
of it below fifty ; who sold the other fifty 
thousand ?” 

“I don’t know.” 

Douglass laughed an ugly little laugh. “I 
do; there was no big interest in Rope except 
your pool. You sold that stuff short, or a 
good part of it, and broke the price on your 
own associates. I could prove it, I suppose, if 
1 went at it carefully, but I don’t need to, — I 
know it.” 

“You are at liberty to prove anything you 
can. There was bad faith all around; I was 
shrewd enough to take the numbers of all the 
certificates I delivered, and three of the mem- 
bers were peddling out on me. It was a game 
of dog eat dog, — I took care of myself. The 
bulk of your personal loss was sustained on 


32 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


your independent transactions, I was under 
no obligation to help you there; I knew what 
you were doing all the time.” 

“I’m not making any protest about my per- 
sonal losses, I’ve been in this game for twenty 
years, and no one ever heard me whimper. I 
lived up to my agreement with you, and you 
cold-decked me. I came here to let you know 
that I understood.” 

A slow flush came upon Bruce’s face. He 
turned to his desk and pushed a button, then 
resumed his writing. 

Douglass rose and walked close up to him. 
“I’m going,” he said. “I suppose you’re ac- 
customed to having the people you cheat come 
here and fall into a panic when you glare at 
therm That kind of play-acting won’t work 
with me. I’m going to wait my time, and some 
day I’ll play dog eat dog with you again.” 

On the train that night Douglass reflected 
with grim satisfaction on his interview. He 
knew that what he had said about the play- 
acting was true, and that nothing makes that 
sort of an actor so angry as to have his art 
discovered. 


CHAPTER IV. 


The Mocker. 

When he reached Chicago, Douglass went 
at once to his apartments. The events of the 
week had been very trying, and despite his 
unruffled demeanor, the strain had told on 
mind and body. To be naturally cool and 
composed is one thing, and to repress all visi- 
ble signs of agitation by sheer force of will is 
another, — the latter process increases the real 
tension. But he had been banking those in- 
ternal fires all his life, and a burst of anger, or 
loud words were unknown things to him. 

He had been drinking even more heavily 
than usual for three or four days, but now, for 
some reason, his whiskey did not taste right, — 
it nauseated him. He sat down in his great 
leather arm-chair and tried to compose himself 
to read, but a feeling of depression and nervous- 
ness harassed him, and at intervals he rose 
and paced the floor. Once, sitting in the chair, 
he fell into a sort of stupor, and sprang up 
affrightedly tat the sound of some one speak- 
ing his name shrilly almost in his ear. There 
was no one there. He took a drink and sat 
down again. Once more he fell into the stupor 


33 


34 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 

and *awoke with a sharp jar, as if some force 
had lifted his chair and dropped it. He rose 
and walked to the buffet, but his legs trembled 
under him, and he staggered as he walked. He 
steadied himself against the wall, and at- 
tempted to pour a drink, but the decanter 
dropped from his trembling hand with a crash. 
He felt his legs giving way beneath him, but 
by a great effort he managed to reach the elec- 
tric button, pressed it, and fell heavily to the 
floor. 

****** 

When he recovered consciousness, after 
many hours, old Doctor Graves, who had been 
his friend and physician for many years, was 
seated beside the bed. 

"What was it?” Douglass asked. "What’s 
the matter with me?” 

"Over-stimulation. I got here just in time 
to keep your heart beating.” 

"How long are you going to keep me in 
bed?” 

"You can get up now if you want to ; you’re 
safe enough for the time being.” 

The old doctor took a turn or two across 
the room, then came and seated himself on 
the bed. 

"Jack,” he said, "you’re in a bad way; you’ve 
been drunk for four years.” 


THE MOCKER 


35 


The old doctor’s solemn face and the words 
he uttered struck Douglass as being funny. 
He laughed and said: 

“That ought to be a record.” 

But Doctor Graves did not smile: “You are 
on the verge of nervous prostration,” he said. 
“You can’t keep it off long unless you change 
your whole method of life. You will either 
die or go crazy ; you have been living on 
alcohol and forcing your brain to do its nor- 
mal work with no body back of it. Did you 
ever have one of these sinking spells before?” 

“No.” 

“It is the beginning of the end. Nature’s 
bills are coming due, and you can’t meet 
them.” 

Douglass lay quiet, staring at the ceiling. 
He knew that this man was telling him the 
truth. He was a friend as well as a physician, 
and above all, a wise, tolerant, progressive 
man. 

“What must I do,” Douglass said at last. 

“Will you put yourself entirely in my 
hands, Jack?” 

For a time the sick man made no reply. He 
knew what that meant : no more business, 
no more whiskey probably. After all, what 
was the use of living; divorced from everything 
in life? He decided on a compromise. 

“For how long?” he asked. 


36 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


‘'Six months.” 

Again he stared at the ceiling for a time, 
and then said : 

“All right, what must I do?” 

“First of all, give up business affairs of 
every kind, and go away to some quiet place 
in the woods or mountains. Not to a fashion- 
able resort, mind you, but to some place 
where you will have to rough it. I want your 
mind to rest and your body to work.” 

“When shall I start?” 

“This is the twenty-fifth of April ; start the 
first of May.” 

“Very well. I’ll go and see Billy Matthews; 
he knows where all the God-forsaken places 
are. I think I’ll go crazy sure enough in one 
of them, but it’s a bargain.” 

“Wait and see; perhaps health and strength 
will develop new interests in life for you.” 

Another pause, then Douglass said slowly : 
“Must I give up the whiskey?” 

“I’m not going to place any injunctions on 
you; the cure lies with the individual. The 
desire for drink is, in its first stages, nervous- 
ness, then it becomes a necessity. Get your 
mind and body normal and you won’t want 
whiskey.” 

“I’m not quoting from medical books,” the 
doctor continued; “I was a drunkard once, — 
I’ve been through the mill. I quit after a 


THE MOCKER 


37 


night like this of yours. Then I began to live 
and to see with a clear brain what had been 
all in a mist before. I swore off, and when I 
found myself craving liquor I sat down and 
asked myself what that craving was : I found 
out. In the last analysis, drinking is a state 
of the mind — an hallucination. I conquered 
liquor with my mind. Let me show you 
something.” 

He crossed the room to the little buffet and 
poured out a glass of whiskey, lifted it to his 
lips and drank it. 

“I have been up with you all night, — I’m 
tired; that drink will do me good. I do not 
want another, no normal man ever does. That 
is the only way we can cure drunkenness, — 
by killing the desire. The man who swears to 
abstain is always in danger. What we want is 
temperance, not abstinence. As long as you’re 
afraid of the stuff, it will keep after you and 
down you again.” 

“I don’t want to stop off short,” Douglass 
said, “but I’ll reduce the rations, and I’ll fol- 
low your advice. I’m out of the market now, 
and come to think of it, I couldn’t be much 
more restless than I am right here.” Then, 
with a touch of sadness that seldom came into 
his voice or showed itself on his face, he con- 
tinued : “You know I haven’t a soul on earth, 
no family, no folks. Outside of you and Billy 


38 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


Matthews, I haven’t even any friends; I’m a 
lonesome kind of a beggar. I might as well be 
on a desert island for all the company this 
crowded town is to me.” 

After the doctor had gone Douglass reflected 
at length on his new project. Once he had 
made up his mind to it, the thing did not 
appear so unattractive. As he lay thinking 
what had befallen him in the last month, a 
great nausea for all that crowd of heavy, slow- 
moving, dollar-hunting men came over him. 
Was it worth while? Maybe Matthews was 
right; maybe there was something in the 
world bigger than a ten-dollar bill. 

But the gamester’s spirit was still upper- 
most, and a little later he told himself that he 
would have plenty of time to think and scheme 
while he was resting, and that when he re- 
turned, improved in mind and body, he would 
be in better condition to play dog eat dog with 
Bruce. 


CHAPTER V. 


The Start. 

A week later Douglass alighted from a Pull- 
man car at a little station on the state line of 
Michigan and Wisconsin. The last hours of 
his ride had been through a country almost 
uninhabited, nothing but woods and water. 
Reared in a city, it was almost impossible for 
him to realize that a night’s ride could carry 
him into a wilderness. At first the car had 
been filled with fishermen and pleasure- 
seekers, but one by one they had dropped out, 
and at “State Line” he was the only passenger. 

Physically, he was beginning to feel a little 
better. He had arranged his business affairs 
so that they could be left indefinitely, and he 
had cut down the whiskey and was getting a 
little appetite for food. 

As he stood alone on the little platform, he 
looked ruefully after the disappearing train, — 
he was homesick already. Once his mind was 
made up to leave the city, he had taken some 
interest in the purchase of his equipment for 
the trip, and on the train he bad listened with 
pleasure to the stories the passengers told of 
the woods and lakes, but now he stood there 
on the platform, solitary and disgusted. 


39 


40 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


Matthews had notified a guide, a half-breed 
Indian, to meet him at the station, but 
he was not in evidence. The baggageman had 
dumped his trunk on the platform, and Doug- 
lass sat down on it and lit a cigar. He was in 
for it now and might as well make the best of 
it. He wondered where the guide was, and 
what he looked like. He had formed a vague 
mental picture of a man in a blanket, smoking 
a pipe of peace, and making guttural sounds ; 
his information about Indians was not very 
comprehensive. 

As he sat ruminating dolefully, a young man 
came walking briskly towards him across a. 
little clearing. 

“Mr. Douglass,” said he, “I’m a little late. I 
started in time, but snagged my canoe and had 
to patch her. My name is George Clark.” 

Douglass was surprised, — nice kind of an 
aborigine this, without a blanket or a pipe of 
peace, and worst of all, a good plain English 
vocabulary. His black hair, straight, spare 
form and brown skin were the only touches of 
the Indian in his makeup. 

Quickly Douglass revolved the ethics of the 
situation in his mind< This man was his ser- 
vant, and he was accustomed to treat servants 
rather coolly. But some way the present situa- 
tion seemed different. His quick intuition 


THE START 


41 


solved the question. He extended his hand 
and said heartily: 

“It’s all right, I didn’t mind waiting.” 

The half-breed looked at the trunk: “Guess 
I’d better take that over to the store, it’s only 
about a hundred rods from here; we can pack 
what you want and leave it here, — you know 
we couldn’t go far with that trunk.” 

Douglass didn’t know, but he nodded ac- 
quiescence. The guide swung the trunk easily 
to his shoulder and they started along the path 
that led through the woods to the store. 

“Where do you want to go,” he asked Doug- 
lass as they walked. 

“I don’t know. Mr. Matthews told me you 
knew this country like a book — I want to start 
out a little easy at first.” 

“How long are you going to stay?” 

“I don’t know that either.” He was going 
to add, “as long as I can stand it,” but 
changed it to “as long as I like it here.” 

“I can take you over to Crooked Lake, it’s 
an easy trip, three short portages. We can 
start in an hour or two and get there by sun- 
down. There’s a shack there, and you can lie 
there for a while and work on into the woods 
later. Good muscallonge fishing there, and 
bass a mile away. 

“All right, that will suit me first rate.” 
Douglass didn’t know exactly what a shack 


42 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


was, he had no conception of portages, long or 
short, and he cared nothing about either mus- 
callonge or bass s but as the die was cast, he 
decided with a true gambler’s spirit to go any- 
where that this counterfeit Indian suggested. 
So long as he was to be buried, it made little 
difference where the grave was. 

They arrived at the store, and went inside. 
It proved to be more saloon than store; one 
side of the room was filled with shelves con- 
taining canned goods and dried meats ; some 
boxes were lying about the floor, and across the 
other side stretched a rude bar. At a table in 
the rear of the room two lumbermen in cor- 
duroys sat on boxes playing cards with a stocky 
individual in shirt-sleeves, evidently the pro- 
prietor. 

They looked up and nodded as the new- 
comers entered, and went on with their game. 
The half-breed disappeared into a back room 
with the trunk, and returning, seated himself 
in silence on a box. There was an atmosphere 
of restraint in the room that Douglass did not 
like. It would have been all right in the city, 
but not here. He quickly decided that the 
initiative should be on his part, and after con- 
sidering a moment said : 

“Will you gentlemen have a drink?” 

The shirt-sleeved individual rose and planted 
himself behind the bar, as one v/ho knew what 


THE START 


43 


the answer would be. The two lumbermen 
and the guide promptly arrayed themselves 
before the dispenser. All ordered whiskey, and 
as the glasses were being placed, a genial air 
of sociability quickly developed. These rough 
men were not going to push themselves in, but 
they responded with alacrity to the good- 
natured advances of the stranger. 

The whiskey was , quickly disposed of, and 
instead of resuming their game, they began 
talking of the region in which they lived. They 
showed great interest in Douglass and his 
plans, and gave advice and information freely. 
The city man realized after a few minutes that 
he was absorbed in their talk, and that he him- 
self was conversing without restraint or watch- 
fulness. When George called him away in 
half an hour to help make up the pack, he re- 
gretted leaving. There was a freedom, a frank- 
ness, and a rough courtesy that he liked. 

He threw open his trunk in the little back 
room, and the guide selected or rejected one 
article after another as Douglass produced 
them ; the woodsman smiled to himself at 
some of the contents of the trunk, but showed 
no surprise. When Douglass produced a com- 
pass weighing a pound, it went into the pack. 
The man saw that Douglass considered it ai 
triumph of forethought and decided not to dis- 
appoint him. For himself, he knew how to tell 


4 


44 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 

the North by the face of his watch, by the 
bark on the trees, and in several other ways. 

The pack being completed by the addition 
of some of the half-breed’s own possessions, 
Douglass arrayed himself in a suit of bright 
new corduroys, a sweater, and rubber boots. 
Three-fourths of the impedimenta he had pur- 
chased went back into the trunk. He found 
out later why a pack must be made as light as 
possible. 

He walked out into the bar a little ill at 
ease in his unaccustomed clothing, but with a 
new sense of interest in the proceedings. 
George swung the pack on his back by a strap 
across his forehead, and gave the word that 
all was ready. The men shook hands all round 
with the air of being old friends, wished each 
other good luck, and the guide trudged out and 
down the wood road, followed by his employer. 
Douglass noted with envy and admiration the 
easy swinging gait of the young half-breed, 
and wondered how far he would go* with that 
heavy pack before he gave out. He got his 
answer: George turned to him and said: “Now 
vHien you get tired, just sing out and we’ll 
rest a bit,” and trudged on. Douglass walked 
steadily behind him for two hours, and then 
called a halt. The guide had not stopped once 
to ease the heavy load. 


THE START 


45 


After a brief rest they resumed the journey; 
there was very little conversation, the road was 
both rough and soft, and Douglass needed all 
his breath to keep up with the tireless, steady 
gait of his guide. 

At noon they left the road and for half an 
hour followed a trail through the woods. Here, 
the walking was worse. After tripping a dozen 
times on roots that grew across the path, 
Douglass learned to “pick up his feet.” The 
branches struck him in the face, and the per- 
spiration streamed off him, but he kept on un- 
complainingly. Then they came suddenly out 
of the woods and stood upon the shore of a 
little lake. George dropped the pack and 
Douglass sat down upon it and mopped his 
face. The guide looked at him curiously. 

“Tired ?” he asked. 

“Off, not very,” Douglass replied gamely. 
“Dm a little soft yet.” 

Without any further comment, George dis- 
appeared in the woods. Douglass had no idea 
where he was going, or what was coming next. 
He gazed with admiration on the placid little 
lake. He was very tired, and also rather hun- 
gry, and wondered where and when they would 
get dinner. 

George soon reappeared in a canoe. He 
shoved it up to the bank, jumped out, and held 
it cautiously as he directed Douglass how to 


46 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


seat himself. Then he placed the pack in it, 
seated himself in the stern, and drove the canoe 
lightly through the water with his single paddle. 

The cool breeze fanned 1 Douglass’ hot face, 
the trees murmured gently as they swung in 
the wind, the clear air filled his lungs, and a 
sense of rest and peace came over him as the 
canoe slipped noiselessly across the lake. He 
began to think that this hobby of Billy Mat- 
thews’ wasn’t so bad after all — he was en- 
joying it. He reflected with pleasure on the 
little scene at the store, and felt that he had 
carried his part of it well. Then he realized 
with surprise that he had not thought of tak- 
ing a drink for hours. The novelty and occu- 
pation of the day had removed it entirely from 
his thoughts. 

“I believe the old man jWas right,” he said 
to himself, “it is a state of the mind.” 

When they arrived at the other side of the 
lake George said : “I’ll have to double the trail ; 
you can come with me the first trip and catch 
some fish while I’m gone.” 

“All right,” Douglass answered briskly. He 
didn’t know what doubling the trail was and he 
didn’t care, — the rid'e on the lake had refreshed 
and cheered him. 

The guide swung the canoe upon his head, 
bottom upward, and plunged into the forest 
with Douglass bringing up the rear. 


THE START 


47 


The portage was a short one and in ten min- 
utes they arrived on the shores of another little 
lake. Douglass noted with surprise tnat the 
water in this lake was of a green tint, while 
in the other one it had been perfectly clear. He 
remarked on this and George said : “These 
little lakes are land-locked; you’ll find three or 
four different kinds of water in this region. 
This looks like Lake Superior w'ater.” 

He put the canoe into the lake and drew a 
fish-line from his pocket. Then he cut a pole 
with his knife and tied the line to it. Lastly, 
he stepped into the water and slopped around 
for a moment, returning with a handful of 
small frogs ; these he tied up in a piece of cloth, 
and threw the pole and bait into the canoe. 

“You can catch some fish while I’m gone,” 
lie said, “and we’ll have dinner when I come 
back, — the wall-eyed pike run here. Take the 
canoe and row out a ways.” 

Then he disappeared. Through the trees he 
called back, “Don’t stand up ir the canoe.” 

Douglass was not pleased. He didn’t want 
to catch fish, and he didn’t know how to paddle 
a canoe. He had a vague recollection of go- 
ing fishing when he was a boy, and remem- 
bered that he enjoyed it then, but now it held 
no attractions for him. 

“But I’ve received my orders,” he mused, 
“I suppose I’ll have to obey them.” 


48 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


He waded out at the side of the canoe, feel- 
ing every step on the bottom of the lake gin- 
gerly ; stepping in, he pushed the boat off awk- 
wardly. When he essayed to paddle, the canoe 
described all sorts of movements. It moved, 
but never in the right direction, He strug- 
gled and perspired, but made no progress. 
Then he took the paddle out of the water and 
sat looking at it thoughtfully. 

“I see it now, I must guide it and drive it 
forward at the same time by turning the 
blade.” He tried it again and in a few minutes 
was getting along better, and he felt gratified 
at the trifling victory. 

Fifty yards from the shore he laid down his 
paddle and took up the fishing tackle, baited 
the hook and dropped it into the water. In 
another minute he was oblivious to everything 
in the world except that he was struggling 
with a fish. 

“It’s a big one?” he said aloud; “by George, 
it must be a whopper.” 

After a brief struggle he had it in the boat, 
a four-pound pike with opalescent eyes and 
golden scales. He had never imagined a fish 
could be so beautiful. He did not spend much 
time admiring it, however. The spell was on 
him and he was eager to repeat the experience. 
He took the fish from the hook excitedly, some 
old forgotten dexterity of his boyhood days 


THE START 


49 


assisting him. In the next half hour he 
landed five more, all smaller than the 
first one. 

“Wish I could get a big one again,” he 
thought, and then smiled at his interest in fish- 
ing. Then something happened which was 
worth while: the end of his pole disappeared 
with a swish, then it was dragged sidewise so 
forcibly as to almost wrest it from his grasp; 
no doubt about the big one this time. For ten 
minutes he fought and pulled, his heart beat- 
ing like a trip-hammer and his eyes bulging. 
Then he saw a great dorsal fin cut the water, a 
pair of milky eyes glared up at him, and swish, 
it was gone again. 

“Keep the line taut,” cried George. He had 
returned with the pack, and was standing on 
the bank; “don’t let him get away.” 

“Hey, come out here,” Douglass roared. “I 
believe I’ve got a shark, or the devil himself.” 

“Keep the line taut,” George repeated. “He’ll 
get away if you let him have a slack line.” 

“Get away, indeed! not for a million.” Again 
the big eyes looked up beside the boat, again 
that huge fin cut the water. With a yell, 
Douglass dropped the pole, stretched out his 
arms, half rolled, half tumbled out of the canoe, 
and in an instant stood spluttering in four 
feet of water with the now thoroughly ex- 
hausted fish clasped to his bosom in a rigid em- 


50 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


brace. And so, he waded triumphantly ashore, 
leaving the canoe to drift where it would. 

The half-breed made a swift observation of 
the boat and the wind, and then entered into 
the: spirit of the thing. 

“That’s a big one,” he said; “a fifteen- 
pounder.” 

“Fifteen pounds! He weighs nearer fifty?” 
Douglass cried, “and I had a fight with him, I 
tell you.” 

Then, half-ashamed of his unwonted enthusi- 
asm, he stopped and! looked at his dripping gar- 
ments, then towards the drifting canoe. 

“Lord,” he said, “I forgot all about the boat.” 

“It’s all right; it will drift ashore while we 
eat dinner, and we’ll have this fellow for our 
dinner, too.” 

Then the ludicrous side of the matter struck 
Douglass, and he burst into a great peal of 
laughter. He had not laughed like that for 
years, and the experience was sound and satis- 
fying. He remembered that the old doctor 
had toldl him to laugh. He: saw now that it 
was good, — a tonic. 

While George was preparing the fish, the 
victorious angler occupied himself by pulling 
off his wet boots and wringing the water from 
his garments. 

“You won’t catch cold,” the half-breed said. 
“You can’t take a cold in these woods.” 


THE START 


51 


“Why not?” 

“I don’t know ; some people say it’s the pine 
and balsam ; anyway, you won’t catch cold.” 

The simple meal was soon ready, and Doug- 
lass fell to it with an appetite he had not known 
for many years. With a tin plate of fish on his 
lap, and a tin cup of coffee in his hand, he 
commented on the food between bites. 

“Talk about your fish,” he said; “I never ate 
fish that tasted like this; they don’t have fish 
like this where I came from.” 

The man was hungry, and he had procured 
the food. 

“You make good coffee, George,” he said; 
“it’s fine.” 

After they had eaten, George produced a 
pipe and filled it. The action made Douglass 
think of his own pipe ; he had not smoked since 
they left State Line,— he had forgotten all 
about it. “I suppose that’s a state of mind, 
too,” he thought, as he filled and lighted the 
pipe. The tobacco was like all the other 
things, — it tasted better than any he had ever 
smoked. He had been a constant smoker, and 
a constant smoker has no conception of the 
pleasure of tobacco. 

They smoked in silence for a time, then the 
guide strapped up the pack, brought up the 
canoe which had drifted ashore a few yards 
below them, and prepared to go on. Douglass 


52 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


rose with a sigh, pulled on his boots, and took 
his seat in the canoe. 

They crossed the lake, and another portage, 
— this time a longer one, — lay before them. 
The half-breed gave a few brief instruc- 
tions. 

“This is a sort of a blind trail,” he said ; “bet- 
ter keep pretty close to me. If you fall behind 
and don’t feel sure of the path, don’t move 
another step ; sit right down and holler. Then 
I’ll come back and look you up. Take it easy, 
it’s a bad trail.” 

And so it proved. At times it led through 
a dense undergrowth; now and then a wind- 
fall lay across the path, and over the great 
prostrate trunk they must climb. They would 
sink to the knees in boggy spots. The guide 
went easily along with the heavy canoe on his 
head, jumping lightly on the fallen trees, and 
pushing resolutely through the tangled branch- 
es, while Douglass panted after him. He did 
not get lost, but saw readily how easy it would 
be to do so. In the density of the trees and 
undergrowth he frequently lost sight of his 
companion, although he could hear him crash- 
ing along a few yards ahead. 

He was forced toi call a halt in a few min- 
utes, and the guide up-ended the canoe against 
a tree, and waited until he had recovered his 
spent breath. 


THE START 


53 


Again they took up the journey, and after 
half an hour of grief a third lake lay suddenly 
before them. The lakes were always a sur- 
prise to Douglass, for no glimpse of them was 
visible until they stood upon their shores. He 
threw himself panting to the ground. 

“Whew,” he cried; “are there any more 
portages ?” 

“No, this lake connects with Crooked Lake 
by a river. We won’t get out of the canoe till 
we get to Kaufman’s shack. You’ll have a 
good rest here while I go get the pack.” 

Douglass looked after him as he re-entered 
the trail. “Two dollars a day,” he said; 
“great Scott!” 

When George returned he found his em- 
ployer lying on the bank asleep. He wakened 
him and they started onward. Douglass looked 
around for the opening to the river, but the 
banks were all alike to him, — a solid circle of 
trees. He did not see the river until they 
entered it. The stream was one with many 
turnings, and as the canoe slipped along its 
winding course, the guide whispered, “Keep 
quiet; we may see a deer, they feed in this 
creek.” 

Later they came upon a buck and two does 
feeding on the lily pads. The beautiful ani- 
mals were standing belly-deep in the stream 
with their heads completely submerged. The 


54 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


buck lifted his magnificent head first, looked 
thoughtfully at the canoe a moment and waded 
ashore, followed by his family. 

They were the first wild deer Douglass had 
ever seen on their native heath, and he was 
greatly interested. 

‘Til tell Billy Matthews about them,” he re- 
marked; “only I’ll tell him there were six; he 
told me he saw four once.” 

They came out upon Crooked Lake just as 
the sun was sinking over the tree tops. It was 
a larger lake than any of the others, and on its 
farther shore a little log house stood., The 
guide pointed to it with his paddle: “That’s 
Kaufman’s shack, — I’ll let him know we’re 
coming.” He made a trumpet of his handis, 
and sent a long, clear halloa across the water. 
A man appeared in the doorway for a moment, 
then disappeared within. 

“He’s gone to get supper for us,” George 
explained. 

“Good; I’m hungry again.” 

When the canoe grated on the bank at 
Kaufman’s shack, the proprietor came out to 
welcome them. He was a gigantic, bearded 
man with a good-natured face. He greeted 
them cordially, but made no distinction be- 
tween them, — a man was a man to Kauf- 
man; sometimes less, but never more than 
a man. 


THE START 


55 


“Come right in, come right in,” he said in a 
voice as big as his frame. “Supper’s on the 
fire ; started her soon as I see you coming. My 
name’s Kaufman, Bill for short;” he addressed 
the last to Douglass. 

“And mine is John Douglass, Jack or Doug 
for short.” 

There was something that encouraged in- 
stant familiarity in the big man’s honest bluff- 
ness. He breathed an atmosphere of powerful 
strength and wonderful magnetic health. As 
Douglass made his quick reply, the giant 
roared with laughter, as though he had heard 
the best joke in the world. 

“I’ll take Jack,” he said. “Got some sheep 
for dinner; like sheep?” 

“I don’t ordinarily care for mutton,” he re- 
plied, “but I like anything today.” 

At the mention of mutton, the big man 
slapped his leg and roared again. George ex- 
plained that “sheep,” in the vernacular of the 
woods, was venison. 

Douglass had never eaten venison like that, 
and, in truth, it was not altogether his good 
appetite which made it taste so different., The 
venison of the woods and that of the city do 
not taste alike. 

After supper the three men sat around and 
chatted for a time. If George had been a sur- 
prise, the host was a revelation. He had been 


56 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


for years on the fringe of civilization ; in Cali- 
fornia and Montana he had following the min- 
ing camps. He told tales of the woods and 
hills which were of absorbing interest, and his 
simple manner of relating them gave them the 
stamp of absolute truth. He was not wholly 
unread either, as the few books and maga- 
zines scattered about the cabin evidenced. 

“Don’t you get lonesome out here?” Doug- 
less asked 

“Oh, it’s a little dull sometimes, but I get 
lonesomer in a city. I left the towns twenty 
years ago, and now and then I’d drift back, 
but the times got further and further apart. 
Someway I need lots of elbow room; out here 
I have things my own way, and what with 
estimatin’ timber, and trappin’, and one thing 
and another, I keep busy and make a livin’, 
more than a livin’: I’ve got a thousand dollars 
in the bank at St. Paul, but I don’t set much 
store by money.” Pointing to a rifle hanging 
over the door, he added : “If I had to take my 
choice between that gun and the thousand dol- 
lars, I wouldn’t look at the money. 1 never 
could see what a man wants with more money 
than he can use; even a chipmunk has got 
more brains than to carry more corn into his 
hole than he can eat.” 

When Douglas went to bed that night he 
gave a sigh of delicious satisfaction as he 


THE START 


57 


stretched out on the rough mattress. He lay 
awake for a time revolving in his mind the 
events of the day; it had been most satisfac- 
tory, and had been full of pleasant surprises. 
He had seen new things, and had fallen in 
with men who cared for something besides dol- 
lars. The men were the greatest surprise of 
all : he had preconceived the inhabitants of a 
wilderness as uncouth, easily impressed with 
city grandeur, and longing for city life. He 
found them today intelligent, hospitable, and 
honest. He told himself that he had met two 
superior specimens : he was mistaken. The 
exaggerated types of fiction and stageland ex- 
ist in books and on the stage, but in truth, 
men are much alike the country over or, for 
that matter, the world over. 

Sleepily he reviewed the newly acquired 
knowledge of the day. He could talk to Mat- 
thews now of portages and blind trails and 
doubling the trail, and land-locked lakes and 
wall-eyed pike and sheep and six deer. 

It had been a good day, — a fine day, — and 
so deciding, he fell into a sweet, healthful 
sleep, and dreamed of placid lakes and trees 
and quiet streams, and finally, of catching a 
gigantic fish with cold, grey eyes, and a slit 
for a mouth. 


CHAPTER VI. 


The Map Maker. 

For the next week Douglass remained at 
Crooked Lake, finding new things each day to 
interest him, and gaining rapidly in health, 
strength, and knowledge. He began to feel 
himself quite a woodsman, and talked glibly 
with Kaufman and George in the new vernacu- 
lar he was acquiring. He viewed each novelty 
with boyish curiosity, paddled his canoe well 
enough, and even essayed to carry it across a 
short portage on one of the daily trips, but 
gave it up before he had gone ten rods. He 
awakened each morning early, fresh and ready 
1o jump out of bed and run for a plunge in the 
cool waters of the lake, and looked forward 
to meal time with pleasure. He contrasted 
this arising with the slow torture of that 
process during the last few years of his fevered 
life. The old sluggish depression dropped 
from him like a smothering mantle, and at 
times he could scarcely refrain from filling his 
lungs with the clear, clean air and expelling it 
in a long, meaningless shout. He was begin- 
ning to be a normal being. 

To be sure, two weeks of right living had 
not made of him a whole, strong man, but 


58 


THE MAP MAKER 


59 


nature, assured of his co-operation, had set 
her myriad of tiny architects to work repair- 
ing the breaches which years of strain and dis- 
sipation had made. 

He thought sometimes of the city, and won- 
dered how long the novelty of his present 
estate would hold him. He hoped a long time, 
a very long time. 

Meanwhile he was already formulating 
plans for extending his trip. The stories of 
scenes a little farther on interested him greatly. 
He had about decided to enter the Ontonagon 
River and push up that stream for a few days, 
when an event occurred to change his plans. 

As they were seating themselves at supper 
one evening, a canoe grated on the beach and 
a stranger walked into the cabin. He spoke to 
Kaufman and George familiarly, but Doug- 
lass noted that his host did ! not greet him very 
cordially. The newcomer removed his coat 
and seated himself at the table without any 
preliminaries, as is the custom in those parts. 
Douglass looked him over and decided 1 at once 
that he did not like him. His forehead was 
too narrow, and his eyes were too close to- 
gether. He conversed pleasantly, however, 
and Douglass soon learned that his name was 
Wilson, and that he knew the woods remark- 
ably well. 

“Come in from Rest Lake?” George asked. 


5 


60 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


The stranger nodded. 

“Estimatin' timber?” 

“No, making a government map. I've been 
from one end of these waters to the other; if 
I was to follow instructions and put down 
every lake I find, they would need a book for 
the names. Fact is, half of ’em haven’t got any 
names, and I’ve invented names till I’ve run 
out.” 

“Come through Wildcat Lake?” 

“Yes, and worse than that. I found a little 
lake near Wildcat that aint on any of the maps ; 
I named it The Kitten.’ I found another new 
lake twenty miles the other side of Wildcat, on 
an old Indian trail that had been blazed out, I 
’spose, fifty years ago. I’ve seen many a 
pretty lake in this country, — I’ve been all over 
the Manitowish Waters, Turtle Waters, and 
the Eagle Waters, and I aint much for pretty 
lakes, not when you have to chop your way 
to ’em, — but this one beats ’em all ; it’s a 
beauty. It’s round as a bowl, and there’s a 
little island right in the center of it, like the 
hub of a wheel.” 

He took a chart from his pocket and spread 
it on his knee, and put his finger on one of 
the little circles with which it was covered. 

“Here it is,” he said; “I named it ‘Lost 
Lake.’ I don’t guess any one will bother it 
for a while, it took me two days to get to it.” 


THE MAP MAKER 


61 


Kaufman was looking at the chart; he put 
his finger on another circle near the one Wilson 
had indicated, “That’s Harrison’s Lake, I 
suppose,” he said. 

“Yes,” Wilson answered slowly, “that’s Har- 
rison’s.” 

“Harrison living there yet?” 

“Yes, Harrison’s living there yet.” 

“You talk like a parrot,” Kaufman said. 

The man scowled, folded the map and re- 
placed it in his pocket. 

“I’d like to go to Lost Lake,” Douglass said 
to George. 

Wilson surveyed him critically: “Well, you 
won’t go there,” he said. 

Then he took the chart out of his pocket and 
spread it on his knees again. “Here’s Crooked 
Lake, where you are now,” he said, pointing 
out the spot on the map, “and here’s Lost 
Lake, and right in here” (indicating a circle 
midway between the two) “is where the good 
trails end. I didn’t name that lake yet, but 
I’m going to call it ‘Tenderfoot Lake,’ be- 
cause that’s as far as a tenderfoot would ever 
get.” 

Douglass flushed but made no response. 
Kaufman had gone outside to feed his dog, a 
friendly little water-spaniel by which he set 
great store. Wilson was not so brisk when 
Kaufman was around. 


62 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


“Then, again,” Wilson continued, “there’s 
bears on that Lost Lake trail; 1 saw their 
sign.” 

Douglass eyed him for a moment, then said 
in the cool, insolent manner he could so easily 
assume, “Are you afraid of bears?” 

Before the map maker could frame a suit- 
able answer, Kaufman entered. He heard the 
query Douglass had made, and noted by its 
tone and Wilson’s look that there had been 
some quibbling. He took it upon himself to 
answer the question. 

“No ; Wilson aint afraid of bears ; cause why, 
cause the bears is afraid of him. A bear is 
the biggest coward on earth.” 

The map maker made no reply, but walking 
out of the cabin and down to the beach, pre- 
pared to leave. 

After a moment’s hesitation Douglass fol- 
lowed him; he did not feel satisfied with him- 
self, — he was not sure but that his early preju- 
dice against the man had been unjust, and 
had led him to imagine insult where none was 
intended. Besides, he wanted to hear more 
about Lost Lake. 

“Who owns that island in Lost Lake,” he 
asked the map maker. His ideas of titles in 
this region were very vague. 

The man looked at him contemptuously. 
“Nobody,” he answered briefly, and began 


THE MAP MAKER 


63 


shoving his canoe into the water. As he 
pushed the boat out, a rope, which was attached 
to the prow, dragged along after it. Kaufman’s 
water-spaniel ran up and seized it playfully in 
his teeth. With an oath, Wilson kicked the dog 
viciously in the ribs, and the spaniel ran howl- 
ing away. 

Kaufman was out through the door at the 
first yelp of his pet, but he was not quick 
enough, for Wilson lay stretched on the sand 
with a bleeding face, and Douglass was stand- 
ing over him with a fierce, unholy joy in his 
heart. 

“He kicked your dog, Kaufman/' he cried; 
“the little fellow was playing with the rope.” 

Kaufman strode up to Wilson and lifting him 
in one hand by the collar, shook him as a 
terrier does a rat and threw him headlong into 
the lake. Then he pushed the canoe off fiercely 
with his foot and roared : 

“Don’t you never beach that canoe on this 
side again, damn you.” 

The map maker crawled into his boat with- 
out a word, and the men entered the cabin 
again. Inside, Kaufman seized Douglass’ hand 
in a hearty grip. 

“Jack,” he said, “you’re all right, you done 
him fine. I aint got no use for a man that’ll 
kick a dog.” 


64 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


Douglass was well pleased. He never had 
struck a, man before, but he had no regret for 
his action, and Kaufman’s honest approbation 
added to the victory. 

Before he went to bed that night he said to 
George : 

“Could you find that Lost Lake?” 

“Yes” 

“How long would it take to go there?” 

George reflected ; estimated the time it would 
take him alone, and multiplied it by three. 

“Six days; we could go to Harrison’s in 
three days and rest a day or two, and then cut 
in from there.” 

“Do you know the way to Harrison’s?” 

“I’ve never been there, but I can find it.” 

“All right, we’ll start tomorrow. I’m going 
to camp on Nobody’s Island before I stop.” 

“I’ll bet you will,” roared Kaufman, “just 
because that skunk said you couldn’t go there.” 

Which showed that Kaufman was no poor 
judge of human nature. 


CHAPTER VII. 


Harrison's Lake. 

Three days later the two men stood on the 
North shore of Harrison’s Lake. The last 
portage, a long one, had been a severe trial 
on Douglass’ nerve and endurance, but he had 
never entertained a thought of turning back. 
Twice he missed the obscure trail, and follow- 
ing George’s instructions, stopped short and 
shouted. The first time, the guide was far 
ahead, struggling with the dense crackling 
undergrowth and did not hear the cry. For 
a fleeting second Douglass realized what be- 
ing lost in the forest meant. The silence, 
which had seemed so novel and beautiful to 
him before, became terrible now. He recalled 
vividly the stories Kaufman had told of men 
who, lost among these trees, had never been 
heard of again until some wanderer chanced 
upon their bones. A chill of fear struck him 
and he shouted again with redoubled energy. 
The answering halloa of the guide was sweet 
music to his ears. 

As he pushed, and climbed, and crawled his 
way along that last trail it was clear to him 
why Wilson had doubted his ability to reach 


65 


66 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


Lost Lake, but now as he stood on the shore 
with the prospect of a rest, and the knowl- 
edge of a victory, he felt a thrill of gratifica- 
tion. He was more of a man than Wilson 
thought him. 

Exhausted as he was, he could not refrain 
from a little harmless acting, and as they sat 
down to rest he carelessly filled and lighted 
his pipe and remarked nonchalantly to George : 
“Pretty tough trail, that.” 

“About as bad as it could be. It’s the worst 
and longest portage I’ve found in these waters. 
I wouldn’t have believed any one but a woods- 
man could have followed it. You’re a won- 
der.” 

They rested for a brief time and looked about 
them; the lake was larger than any they had 
yet seen, — several miles in diameter. Away 
over near the south shore was a small island 
which was cleared of trees, and near its cen- 
ter stood a great rambling log cabin. 

That’s the biggest cabin I ever saw,” 
George said; “must be Harrison’s place.” 

“Well, we might as well go over and get 
acquainted ; hope he’s another trump like Kauf- 
man.” 

They embarked and set out for the island. 
To Douglass the prospect of a habitation and 
a bed after two nights in the forest was very 
pleasant. He had enjoyed all his new ex- 


HARRISON’S LAKE 


67 


periences, and his interest had not begun to 
flag, but a little touch of civilization would not 
come amiss now. Even primitive man’s first 
thought after food was of a shelter and some- 
thing soft to rest upon. Also he was getting 
a little less enthusiastic about a fish diet. 
He wondered if they would have as good a 
larder in yonder cabin as Kaufman had ex- 
hibited. 

In the trip across the lake his fatigue left 
him. He took off his cap and let the fresh 
breeze fan his unkempt hair. He thought with 
a smile of what a bedraggled appearance he 
must present, and wondered what his friends 
at home would say could they see him now. 

As they neared the island a man came to the 
door of the cabin and stood looking out over 
the water, George instantly gave his halloa of 
greeting, and the man turned his gaze on the 
canoe for a moment, then walked to the water’s 
edge and waited. 

As they drew near, Douglass noted that he 
was a tall spare man, about sixty years of 
age, with white hair and a soldierly bearing. 
His face and general mien were not exactly in 
keeping with the locality. He was brown and 
active looking, but the face was more that of 
the scholar than of the woodsman. He did not 
speak until they were almost to the beach, then 
in a deep pleasant voice he said : 


68 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


“You came over the Wildcat trail, — it is a 
long time since strangers have entered there.” 

The words, the accent, and the ease with 
which he spoke told Douglass instantly that 
this was a gentleman, a man of culture. The 
knowledge surprised and pleased him ; he 
felt that the presence of such a man 
in this solitude promised a new experi- 
ence, or a story. 

W T hen they stepped upon the beach, the 
stranger approached and extended his hand 
courteously : 

“You are welcome, sir,” he said, “none the 
less because you were unexpected. My name 
is Harrison.” 

“And mine is Douglass.” 

He acknowledged the information with a 
smile, and turning to George, said : 

“Take the pack right up to the house;” then 
he turned to Douglass : 

“You have had a hard trip; most of our 
visitors come in on the Manitowish River, it 
is a comparatively easy route ; you must be 
very tired.” 

“No,” Douglass answered, “I was pretty 
well done up when we reached your lake, but 
the trip across has refreshed me.” 

The white-haired man led the way to the 
cabin, and stood aside for Douglass to enter, 
which he did, but he stopped just inside the door, 


HARRISON’S LAKE 


69 


lost in amazement. The man had been a sur- 
prise, — the room in which he now found him- 
self was a marvel. It was an apartment fully 
thirty feet square, the floor covered with rugs 
of bear, deer, and fox skins. Rustic chairs of 
various designs were scattered about the room, 
and in the center was a huge table of hewn 
logs, covered with an Indian blanket, and 
strewn with books and magazines. The walls 
were hung with mounted skins and pictures 
dirawn on sheets of birch bark. Above the 
fireplace hung a pair of magnificent antlers. 
Shelves filled with books covered one side of 
the room, but save for these and the argand 
lamp which hung above the table, everything 
was a product of the forest. 

With keen appreciation, Douglass noted that 
not a single piece of trumpery spoiled the con- 
gruity. The room was the work of an artist. 

He suddenly became conscious that his host 
was eyeing him quizzically. 

“You must pardon me,” Douglass said. 
“This room astonished me so much I forgot 
my manners. It is the most perfect thing of 
its kind imaginable.” 

“I am gratified to hear you say so; it is a 
great pleasure to me to have the place surprise 
people; it is the pride of the architect, for 
almost everything here I made with my own 
hands.” 


70 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


Then Douglass became suddenly aware of 
his three days’ beard and his torn clothing, for 
a door opened and a young girl entered. 
She stopped at sight of the stranger; she was 
surprised but not embarrassed. 

“Why, we’ve got company,” she cried in a 
clear, sweet voice, and came at once to Doug- 
lass with extended hand. 

“My daughter Mary,” Harrison said: “Mr. 
Douglass, dear.” 

Douglass could not decide whether she was 
a child or a woman. Her short walking skirt 
gave her the appearance of being below the 
average height, and the frank, unembarrassed 
greeting was childlike in its simplicity. But 
one thing he could and did decide quickly, and 
that was that she was very pretty k 

The skin of her face was tanned and brown, 
and the firm little hand she gave him was of 
like color, but the low neck and loose sleeves 
of her simple bodice showed a glimpse of 
creamy whiteness. She was slender, but ex- 
quisitely formed and very graceful ; her 
abundant black hair was combed from her low 
forehead, and hung in one thick braid below 
her waist, and all about her was the indescrib- 
able beauty of perfect health. 

As Douglass returned her greeting lamely, 
and murmured something about his unkempt 
appearance, she smiled up at him frankly, and 


HARRISON’S LAKE 


71 


said : “I mustn’t stand here talking, for 
I know you are very hungry. Father 
will show you your room, and I’ll see 
about your supper.” 

At the door she turned and smiled back at 
him: “You are welcome,” she said; I suppose 
Father told you so.” 

George, who had busied himself about the 
canoe, now came up with the pack. Their host 
led the way to two rooms which opened off 
the larger apartment. 

“You’ll find everything you require, I think. 
Make yourselves at home.” 

George loosened the packs, selected his own 
belongings and withdrew. 

Douglass said not a word ; he was too sat- 
urated with wonder to talk. He sat down on 
the bed and stared straight before him for a 
few minutes, and then said half aloud: “Well, 
I’ll be damned,” and as he shaved and made 
such alterations in his appearance as he could, 
he had recourse to that satisfying expression 
some twenty times. 

At supper another pleasant surprise awaited 
him : The girl had donned a dress of soft, white 
material, and coiled her hair in a mass upon 
her head. These simple changes seemed to 
transform her, and he was undecided which 
was the more entrancing, the little maiden of 
the woods or this beautiful young woman. 


72 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


The supper was excellent and well served. 
The guest said little, but listened with pleas- 
ure to Harrison's deep, musical voice as he 
talked of the cabin and its environments. The 
young girl chatted merrily and winningly, and 
asked questions with a charming frankness 
and naivete. By the time the meal was over, 
Douglass decided that she was a child after 
all; there was about her a total lack of arti- 
ficiality or embarrassment, but despite her in- 
nocence and youth, he felt that she was dis- 
cerning. She looked full in his eyes when he 
addressed her, and two or three times when 
some conventional compliment or phrase was 
on his lips, the words remained unuttered. 

After supper they returned to the large liv- 
ing room, and Harrison produced some excel- 
lent cigars. As they smoked Douglass said: 

“I cannot help telling you what a monu- 
mental surprise everything about this place is 
to me, I had naturally expected to find the 
customary surroundings of the forest dweller, 
and I cannot bring myself to realize that such 
appointments as you have are possible in this 
remote district.” 

Harrison smiled. “As I told you,” he said, 
“I have a weakness for observing the effect of 
my arrangements on the chance visitor, but in 
truth there is nothing extraordinary about it. 
I have simply taken from civilization such 


HARRISON’S LAKE 


73 


things as I wanted, and busied myself supply- 
ing the rest. I make brief pilgrimages to 
Manitowish every two or three weeks, and 
order, or bring back, whatever appears neces- 
sary to my comfort, provided it is something 
which I cannot myself manufacture or pro- 
cure here. I wish to exercise my inventive 
genius and also to keep busy/’ 

“You have lived here long?” 

“Over eighteen years. Forty years of my 
life I spent in the cities ; circumstances which 
would not interest you brought me here. The 
place grew to have many attractions for me; 
at first I did not think of remaining here, but 
little by little I grew more away from 
the populous world, and now I look upon 
the time when I shall leave here with 
deep regret.” 

There was a note of sadness in the last 
words. The speaker paused and reflected for 
a little and then continued : 

“My daughter was born here, but the time 
will probably come when she will want to see 
the world, and when it does, I will take her 
into it.” 

“But she has already been away? She ap- 
pears, — ” Douglass stopped; it was not the 
right thing to say. 

The older man relieved his embarrassment 
promptly. I 


74 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


“She appears educated? So she is: I have 
been her constant and only tutor. One nat- 
urally jumps to the conclusion that education 
and culture are products of the cities only, but 
that assumption will not bear analysis. The 
child is unlearned in many things, but they are 
for the most part things which it is best for her 
not to know. She is innocent and honest. With 
the exception of the two times when she ac- 
companied me to Manitowish she has never 
been away from the island. Knowing noth- 
ing of the world, she has never cared for it, 

‘ — she is happy here, but the world may call 
her some day.” 

Douglass sat silent and interested. 

“I said she was born here,” Harrison con- 
tinued ; her Mother died a short time after her 
birth and is buried on this island.” 

At this moment Mary entered the room and 
seating herself on her Father’s knee, threw her 
arm about his neck. 

Douglass was at a loss as to how he should 
address her. “Miss Harrison” did not accord 
with her or her surroundings, “Mary” was out 
of the question, and “Miss Mary” was worse 
than either; so he avoided the name alto- 
gether. 

“How long are you going to stay,” she 
asked, and both men smiled at the direct ques- 
tion. 


HARRISON’S LAKE 


75 


“I think we will push on tomorrow.” 

“Oh, you mustn’t think of such a thing, you 
must stay ever so long. Father likes you, I 
can always tell in a minute when he likes 
people.” Then artlessly : “Father, make him 
stay, I like him, too.” 

Both men laughed aloud at this, and her 
clear voice joined in the merriment. 

“Where are you bound for?” Harrison asked. 

“We met a map-maker who told us of a 
wonderful lake he had discovered and named 
‘Lost Lake,’ and we set out to find it. You 
probably know him, his name is Wilson.” 

“Yes.” • 

The girl sprang to her feet and addressed 
Douglass excitedly: “He told you he found it 
and named it?” she cried. 

“Yes,” Douglass answered, surprised at her 
vehemence. 

“Well, he didn’t. I found the old blaze one 
day in the woods, and Father and I followed it 
a week later and found the lake, and I named 
it ‘Lost Lake.’ ” 

Douglass did not know what to say; he did 
not want to speak ill of the man, so he kept 
silent. The father and daughter exchanged 
meaning glances, then Harrison led away from 
the subject. 

“If you are going in there,” he said, “I would 
suggest that you rest with us a few days and 


6 


76 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


let your guide go and improve the trail, — it is 
very bad. Mary goes everywhere in these 
woods, but on that trip I had to carry her fre- 
quently.” 

The idea appeared a capital one to Douglass 
and he readily assented. 

“I’ll show you lots of things while you’re 
waiting,” the girl cried. “I know every foot 
of these woods.” 

Harrison laughed. “She knows them better 
than I do,” he said, patting her shoulder lov- 
ingly. “She is a little tramp.” 

In the novelty and interest of the time they 
talked far into the evening. Suddenly the host 
rose and said: 

“You’re tired out with a long, hard trip, you 
must go to bed. And you, too, little one, I 
won’t have any sleepy-heads around me these 
glorious mornings.” 

She kissed him, gave Douglass her hand, and 
bade them good-night. From her room she 
called out to her father: “May I take Mr. 
Douglass over to Lake Mary?” 

“Yes.” 

“Tomorrow morning?” 

“Yes, yes, if he wants to go.” 

“Do you want to go?” she called to Doug- 
lass. 

He did want to go, and said so. 


HARRISON’S LAKE 


77 


When he lay down to rest that night he 
told himself that this had been a red-letter 
day. Everything had been gratifying, some 
things amazing. A scholarly man who lived 
in the woods, read Horace, and smoked Prin- 
cipe de Gales, and a girl, — a beautiful girl, 
who carried herself with the grace and ease 
of a young woman of the world, and who 
tramped in the forest alone, and told a strange 
man she liked him, and invited him for a trip 
in the woods with her. It was all novel and 
very delightful. He thought of her for a long 
time that night, — she was a revelation to him. 

Let him not be misunderstood. In his ad- 
miration there were no foolish nor dishonest 
thoughts. He knew himself, a world-worn 
man of forty, and she was a child, not more 
than eighteen. She trusted him in her inno- 
cence, and moreover her father trusted him, 
for he had unhesitatingly given his consent to 
their expedition the next day. If any disloy- 
alty to such early confidence had entered his 
mind he was man enough to have rejected it 
at once, but there was no such high treason 
in his heart. Perhaps, — I do not know, — but 
perhaps he sighed a little for his vanished 
youth, even as you or I. 


CHAPTER VIII. 


The New Nobility. 

“Where did you get these birds?” Douglass 
ask the next morning at breakfast. “Do you 
keep a game preserve in addition to your other 
wonders ?” 

“Ask Mary,” Harrison said. 

She did not wait to be asked. “I shot them 
over on the West Shore this morning long 
before you got up. They are partridges ; do 
you like them?” 

“I never ate anything so good in my life.” 

“There are a few in these woods, but they 
are very hard to find; I knew where these 
lived and took the dog and went after them 
early. There were eleven in the covey ; I 
could have killed them all.” 

Then she explained how the wood partridge 
will “tree” when a dog flushes them, and pay- 
ing no attention to their human enemy, will 
sit stupidly on the limbs watching the dog, 
while the hunter picks them off one by one 
with a small rifle. 

“Only you have to take care to begin with 
the lowest bird,” she added. “If you kill the 


78 


THE NEW NOBILITY 


79 


top bird and he falls through the limbs where 
the others are sitting, they will all fly, but if 
you begin at the bottom and work up, you can 
get every bird. Do you like to shoot?” 

“I have never used a rifle to any extent, but 
I belonged to a gun club once, years ago, and 
became quite expert with a shot-gun.” 

“There are wild ducks over in my lake, lots 
of them; if you promise to kill only two for 
our dinner, you make take Father’s gun with 
us this morning.” 

Douglass promised. He was very glad of 
the suggestion ; in fact, he had been a very 
good shot at the traps, and he was delighted to 
be able to demonstrate himself not wholly ig- 
norant of all the things these people knew so 
well. 

After breakfast they prepared for the trip 
which had been suggested the night before. 
Harrison handed his guest a shot-gun and am- 
munition, and as he took it, he noticed that it 
was a hammerless gun of high grade. 

As he walked with his host to the beach, 
Mary preceded them ; she was bare-headed, and 
looked charming in a white waist and dark 
blue serge skirt, made quite short; her small 
feet were encased in high russet walking 
boots, and she stepped with a lightness and 
grace that bespoke at once her good body and 
happy mind. 


80 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


“We’ll go in my canoe,” she said, shoving it 
off before he could offer to assist her. “It goes 
easier than the big ones.” 

Douglass eyed the diminutive craft dubi- 
ously. 

“Will it carry us both?” he asked. 

“Oh, yes, if you sit quietly. Father made 
it small so I could carry it.” 

“Suppose you let me paddle?” 

“No, you don’t know the way, and I want 
you to be a sight-seer today.” 

He stepped obediently into the canoe, and 
Harrison shoved the boat off the beach. She 
paddled easily and tirelessly along, displaying 
a skill in handling the paddle which made 
Douglass thank his stars that she had not ac- 
cepted his offer to propel the craft. 

She drove the canoe straight across the lake, 
and almost before her passenger realized it, 
they had left the main body of water and were 
drifting along a quiet little river. The stream 
was narrow, and the branches of the trees 
met overhead and formed a leafy, half-lighted 
tunnel of green. There was no perceptible 
current, and so smooth was the surface of the 
water that every detail of the overhanging 
trees was reproduced below them. In the dim 
light, the clear water itself was almost invisible 
save where it rippled gently about the prow 
of the boat, and they seemed to float in mid-air. 


THE NEW NOBILITY 


81 


For a time Douglass sat in silence, drinking 
in the beauty of the scene, then he said rap- 
turously : 

“How wonderful, how beautiful.” He looked 
around at her and saw that she was smiling, 
pleased at his admiration. 

“This is the river of Imagination,” she said. 
“Father named it that. There is another creek 
on the east side of the lake that is very ugly, 
and you can’t get along it at all, it is full of 
riffles and windfalls and mudholes. Father 
says that’s the river of Superstition.” 

“This one at least is well-named. I 
can almost imagine myself drifting into 
Fairyland.” 

For an hour they slipped along, enjoying in 
silence the beauty of the river, or speaking in 
hushed voices as though they feared to waken 
some of the nymphs and dryads in the trees. 
Then they emerged into the full light of day 
as suddenly as they had left it, and Douglass 
saw that they were on a pretty little lake not 
over a half mile wide. He was about to speak, 
but Mary cautioned him in a whisper to get 
his gun ready. He did so, hoping in his heart 
of hearts that he might acquit himself credit- 
ably when the ducks appeared. She sent the 
canoe quietly around a little promontory and 
stopped before a great patch of wild rice, which 
extended from the shore far out into the waters 


82 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


of the lake. Half a dozen ducks rose from the 
water, out of range, and flew rapidly away. 
Again she whispered “get ready,” and then 
beat on the side of the canoe with her paddle. 
As the sharp sound broke the dead silence, the 
air was filled with whirring wings. The birds 
had been feeding in the rice. Douglass was 
rattled, he knew it, and the birds were gone be- 
fore he had his gun to his shoulder. Just as 
he was about to utter an exclamation of dis- 
appointment, two belated mallards rose in easy 
range, and with a determination not to miss 
Douglass dropped them neatly, one to each 
barrel. It was one of the proudest moments of 
his life when he saw the big birds falling to the 
water. 

“What a splendid shot you are,” Mary cried, 
as she paddled to the dead birds. Douglass 
picked them up and smoothed their plumage 
with his fingers. Possibly there had been two 
such beautiful mallards killed before, but he 
doubted it. 

“Now we can talk,” Mary said, after the 
birds had been duly admired. “Im going to 
run aground here for a moment, and you must 
turn around facing me. I want to see your 
face when you talk, the back of your head is 
not very eloquent.” 

“This is ‘Lake Mary,’ ” she said after the 
change had been accomplished; “I named it 


THE NEW NOBILITY 


83 


after myself, — do you think that it was a con- 
ceited thing to do?” 

“No, I think it is a very pretty name.” 

“And do you think Lake Mary is pretty?” 

“Not as pretty as its sponsor,” he said, and 
instantly regretted the speech. His regret was 
short-lived, however, for he saw by her ani- 
mated face that she was pleased. 

“Do you really think I’m pretty?” she asked, 
with a bewitching smile. 

He was in for it now: “Very pretty.” 

“Oh, I’m glad you think so. When I first 
began to read stories I used to wonder if I 
were pretty, and so I would ask every one who 
came to the island. Almost before they had 
beached their canoes I would call out ‘You 
are welcome, — do you think I am pretty?’ But 
they laughed so at me, — Father most of all — 
that I gave it up. I did so much want to 
know, and you can’t tell by looking at your- 
self in a mirror. Of course, that was when I 
was little, and I’ve learned better now, but 
anyway, I’m glad you think so.” 

After a little smiling silence she asked : 

“How long are you going to stay at ‘Lost 
Lake?’ ” 

“I don’t know. I may camp there a long 
time. I have a desire to have an island all to 
myself, to be monarch of all I survey for a 
while. I asked Wilson who owned the island 


84 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


in Lost Lake, and he said 'nobody/ so I men- 
tally christened it 'Nobody’s Island.” 

"And you are going to be King of Nobody’s 
Island,” she cried in delight; "and Father can 
be the Lord of Harrison’s Island, and that 
makes me the Lady.” 

"Yes,” interrupted Douglass, "you can be 
Lady Mary,” and he was secretly glad that he 
had found a name to call her. 

She clapped her hands in childish enjoy- 
ment. 

"How splendid, and you can ask Father for 
my hand in marriage, or rescue me from a 
tower or something,” and they both laughed 
merrily. 

They chatted on for a time and then she 
picked up her paddle. 

"Now, King Douglass,” she said, "we will 
return to the castle., Have you enjoyed your- 
self?” 

"Had one of the pleasantest mornings of my 
life, Lady Mary.” 

They entered the river again and made their 
way homeward. On the way he learned an- 
other bit of woodcraft. Half way to Har- 
rison’s Lake the girl whispered to him and 
pointed with her paddle to a log which lay 
jutting out into the stream. At first he could 
discern nothing, but on a little closer inspec- 
tion he saw an animal lying on the log asleep. 


THE NEW NOBILITY 


85 


It was about a foot in length, and its heavily 
built body was covered with long, coarse 
hair. He laid his hand on the gun, but she 
cried softly: “Don’t shoot; we never kill por- 
cupines, They are the only food a man lost 
in the woods can get without a gun.” 

As they passed the log she raised the paddle 
and gave the animal a slap on the back, and 
it lumbered heavily along the log toward the 
shore. She held up the paddle for his inspec- 
tion — the hard wood was stuck full of the sharp 
spines. 

But the morning so pleasantly passed was to 
end in disaster. When they were half way 
across Harrison’s Lake on their homeward 
trip, Douglass fumbled in his pocket for his 
pipe. Just as he brought it out it slipped from 
his hand. He made a grab for it, and in an- 
other instant they were both floundering in 
the water. His first thought was for the girl, 
but she cried out to him at once: 

“Don’t try to come to me, I’m all right. Can 
you swim?” 

“A little,” he gasped. “Are you sure you are 
safe?” 

“Perfectly ; don’t let the canoe drift ; you get 
in first.” 

He took a few strokes toward the boat. It 
had righted itself, and he laid his hand on the 
side. It spun over like a teetotum and he 


86 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


went under the water again. When he came 
to the surface Mary was at one end of the 
canoe holding it. 

“Now,” she said, “don’t touch the side ; swim 
to the end and lay your hands on it and jump 
astride.” 

He did so easily and was in the boat in an 
instant. 

“Now I’ll get the paddle,” she said, — it had 
drifted to some distance; she let go the boat, 
and swimming easily on her side, recovered it 
and returned with it to the canoe. 

“Sit steady,” she said, and springing easily 
upon the end of the boat, slipped down into 
her seat. 

Douglass looked, as he felt, chagrined and 
contrite. 

Mary looked at his woe-begone face and 
burst into a ringing laugh. He joined her half- 
heartedly. 

“I hope you can forgive my awkwardness,” 
he said. “I—” 

“Why,” she cried, “it’s nothing. I’ve been 
out of this canoe a dozen times. Don’t* think 
about it at all. I can swim a mile, and a wet- 
ting is no new thing to me.” 

She set the canoe going again, and continued 
to belittle the incident. When they were near 
the beach her father came down to meet them, 
and in her clear, young voice she cried out : 


THE NEW NOBILITY 


87 


“Oh, Father, we’ve had a glorious time, and 
Mr. Douglass is the King of Nobody’s Island, 
and I’m Lady Mary, and he thinks I’m pretty, 
and he’s a splendid shot, and made a double on 
mallards, and we got a ducking, and every- 
thing’s been just splendid.” 

Her father laughed good-naturedly. 
“Couldn’t wait till you got ashore to tell me 
about it,” he said; “did you get your mark- 
ings ?” 

“Of course. George,” she said, turning to 
the half-breed who was coming from the house, 
“you see that rusty place where the spring 
comes down?” pointing to a red stain in the 
brush on the west shore of the Lake. 

He nodded. 

“And those three tall pines?” pointing to a 
group of giant trees on the east side. 

He nodded again. 

“Now from the front door of the cabin 
straight across to that fish-hawk’s nest.” 

“All right,” George said, “I’ll get it.” 

This was all Greek to Douglass. He looked 
from one to the other in surprise. Harrison ex- 
plained. 

“If George goes to the spot where he is in 
line with the rust spot and the three pines, and 
also in a line with the hawk’s nest and the 
cabin door, he will be on the spot where your 
canoe was overturned. I have taught Mary to 


88 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


take her bearings when it is necessary. She 
does it very well, as you see.” 

“I should think she did,” Douglass ejacu- 
lated, “but I’m still a little at sea. What do 
you want to know about that spot for?” 

“Why,” said Harrison with a smile, “I would 
like to have George go and bring in the shot- 
gun.” 

“Great Scott,” cried Douglass, “I was so 
flustered I forgot all about the gun.” 

“Pray, give yourself no concern about it. It 
will be easily recovered.” 

He put his arm about his daughter’s waist 
and they walked toward the house. 

“So you are Lady Mary,” he said, “and our 
guest is a king.” 

“Yes, and you’re a Lord, and I told King 
Douglass, — don’t that sound grand, — that he 
might ask you for my hand in marriage.” 

Harrison roared with laughter, then they all 
laughed together, and the incident of the over- 
turned canoe was forgotten. 

* * * * * * 

When Douglass came to breakfast the next 
morning the gun was hanging in its accus- 
tomed place. 


CHAPTER IX, 


While the Road Was Mending. 

On the following day George departed with 
axe and saw to improve the trail that led to 
Lost Lake. Harrison estimated that to make 
the trail fairly passable would require a week’s 
work. Douglass was not sorry, for he was en- 
joying his present quarters very much. Lady 
Mary was a source of endless amusement and 
delight to him, and her father entertained him 
with his novel discourses on many subjects. It 
soon became apparent to him that this denizen 
of the woods knew more of books than he did. 
When Harrison had given an opinion he was 
always ready to support it by reference to 
some great writer, and as he would finish a dis- 
cussion and walk to the book-shelves, his 
daughter would laugh and say : “Now he’s 
going to prove it out of a book.” 

“No, not* going to prove it,” her father would 
reply, “just going to show you that some one 
agrees with me.” 

“The habit of accepting other people’s ideas,” 
he said to Douglass, “is the cause of a great 
many errors. Most of us are able to form 
clear conclusions for ourselves, but we don’t 
like to do the necessary work, therefore we ac- 


89 


90 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


cept another’s views, right or wrong. Precise 
thinking is very rare, and it is not because of 
lack of capacity, but because of laziness. The 
secret of the matter is that the mind, like the 
body, is naturally inactive and at rest. We 
must exercise it just as we exercise the body 
to keep it healthy and capable, and it requires 
just as much effort to do so as to take your 
regular physical exercise, and the reward is 
just as great. 

“That is true,” Douglass said, “although I 
have never viewed it in that exact light. The 
laborer thinks the man at the desk has an 
easy time simply because he is working in a 
different way/' 

“Exactly, and the man at the desk often en- 
vies the laborer. In order to be healthy in 
mind and body we must give both their regu- 
lar exercise and see that neither is overworked. 
Light reading is a very poor form of exercise, 
but the systematic solving of a problem or 
careful study of a question of the day is ex- 
cellent. When I have nothing else to occupy 
my mind, I frequently read Cavendish or Pole 
on Whist, and I understand the game very 
thoroughly, although I never played it. If I 
follow these writers, I am not only entertained, 
but I teach my brain to classify thoughts and 
ideas of any sort, just as I classify the suits of 
the cards in my hypothetical game.” 


WHILE THE ROAD WAS MENDING 91 

“I find I can think more clearly since I have 
been away from the city, and physically 
healthy,” Douglass said. 

“Certainly. Brain and body are inter-de- 
pendent. The trouble is, we seldom find the 
golden mean. A man is either an athlete or 
a philosopher, — a prize fighter or a book- 
worm.” 

The day after George left, Douglass was 
looking at the birch-bark pictures which hung 
about the walls of the cabin. They were all 
good, but one of them attracted him especially. 
It was a picture of a lone brigand standing in 
a long sweep of roadway; he was muffled in 
a long cloak, his arms were folded, his slouch 
hat drawn low on his brow, and a black mask 
covered his face. 

“I think this is about the most satisfying 
brigand I have ever seen,” Douglass said. 

“I was waiting to hear you express some 
such opinion,” Harrison replied. “Do you 
know why it strikes you so?” 

Douglass studied the picture a few moments. 

“No,” he replied, “I cannot explain why.” 

“It is a conceit of my own,” Harrison said, 
“and I will explain the secret. You are par- 
ticularly struck with the villainous face.” 

Douglass scrutinized the picture again, and 
turned to his host in surprise. 

“Why, his face is wholly concealed.” 


7 


92 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 

“Exactly. No painter could produce a face 
which would conform with the varied ideas of 
individuals as to what was ideally villainous. 
Each man, however, holds such a picture in 
his mind’s eye, and when he finds the correct 
setting, his imagination immediately supplies 
the face behind the mask.” 

Douglass mused for a moment and then said : 

“That’s a fact ; I did see his face, and it was 
my ideal of a villainous one.” 

“No painter, no musician, no artist can hope 
to equal the perfection of the imagination,” 
Harrison continued. “I remember when I was 
a young man I had read Shakespeare earnestly 
and carefully. Richard the Third was my pet 
villain, and I looked forward with keen pleas- 
ure to an opportunity of seeing a great actor in 
that role, and at last the opportunity came, 
but I left the theatre that night bitterly dis- 
appointed. In my imagination I had painted 
the monster in a scene of blood and carnage, 
crying out in a terrible voice that rang out 
above the roar of battle, 'A horse, a horse, my 
kingdom for a horse,’ — and the actor’s concep- 
tion and possibilities, excellent as I afterward 
knew them to be, were very tame compared 
with the picture I had conjured up.” 

Douglass laughed. “The same thing hap- 
pened to me, and I suppose happens to every 
man.” 


WHILE THE ROAD WAS MENDING 93 


“Not to every man, but to every man of 
imagination. I drew this picture we have been 
commenting on for the express purpose of test- 
ing my theory; I am greatly gratified at the 
result.” 

On another occasion Douglass spoke of 
Kaufman and his rude simile of the chipmunk 
and the corn. 

“He was right,” Harrison said. “Perhaps 
the greatest error of the world today, and an 
error which is particularly prevalent in our 
own country, is a total misunderstanding of 
the uses of money. The man who accumulates 
an enormous fortune, past all reasonable limits, 
should be blamed and pitied. Instead, he is 
looked up to and envied. This erroneous view 
by the poorer classes is partly responsible for 
the existence of the evil. The time will come, 
— it may be a long way off, — when the man 
who seeks to accumulate hundreds of millions 
will be looked upon as a monster, a being who 
is not normal, — exactly as Kaufman would 
look upon the chipmunk who worked himself 
to death storing up corn which he could not 
eat. When the proletariat cease to fawn 
upon these greedy creatures who foolishly bur- 
den themselves with superfluous wealth, the 
creatures will grow rarer and rarer until they 
vanish entirely. From the standpoint of the 
multi-millionaire himself he is, as I said, to be 


94 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


pitied as well as looked upon with contempt, 
for he burdens himself with a care and labor 
productive of nothing. His money, past a cer- 
tain point, has no value whatever; and yet in 
most cases he attaches to a dollar a value 
which the man in moderate circumstances 
knows nothing about. Understand, I make no 
objection to a man having a million, ten mil- 
lion, if he can find a genuine use for it in 
gratifying his good desires and tastes, but 
beyond that point he merely burdens himself 
and injures others.” 

“Power,” Douglass suggested. 

“What power, and to what end,” his host in- 
quired. “His wealth gives him the control of 
men and destinies which he has no moral right 
whatever to control. It permits him to dictate 
where he has no moral right to dictate. I can 
think of nothing more egotistical than the 
‘Captain of Industry’ who says, ‘I am more 
fitted to administer wealth than other men,’ 
and straightway locks it up from the world, or 
diverts it to his own aims. And after all is 
said and done he gets nothing but worry and 
trouble from it. He loses his teeth and hair 
worrying about it, and he receives the con- 
tempt of all men whose opinions are worth 
having. I defy you to find in the world today 
one single man possessed of superfluous wealth 


WHILE THE ROAD WAS MENDING 95 


who will acknowledge that he is a happier or 
more contented man because of it.” 

“How about the great philanthropists?” 

“I will grant that there have been men who 
have honestly accumulated a surplus of money, 
and employed it in good charities. They were 
under no obligations to do so, and their task 
was gratuitous. Life was given us to live and 
enjoy. It is not necessary that we do more 
than extend the charities of our own sphere of 
life ; if all did that there would be no need for 
philanthropists. But I have no quarrel with 
the man who makes millions honestly and 
cleanly, and chooses to give them away. He 
is a cardinal exception. Lay your finger on 
one of our so-called philanthropists, and you 
often lay it on a thief and egotist, frequently a 
combination of the two. The thief seeks to 
cozen the poor out of two dollars, and save his 
soul by returning them one. I saw a picture 
of a beautiful stone building not long since, 
given to a city by a famous philanthropist. 
His own name appeared in letters a foot high 
over the central arch, and modestly flanking 
it on the panels at either side were the names 
of Shakespeare, Goethe, Dante, Milton, and 
others, in six-inch letters. I said a while ago 
that the 'Captain of Industry’ was the greatest 
of egotists, — I withdraw the remark.” 


96 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


“But we have the satisfaction of knowing 
that long after his name is forgotten the other 
names will endure.” 

“Yes, after the stone arch itself has crum- 
bled; and in that fact is a proof that the at- 
tainments of dollars are far inferior to the at- 
tainments of art and literature.” 

Harrison continued : “There is another 
point about philanthropy: if I as an individual 
secure a hundred millions, I necessarily sub- 
tract a large part of that sum from others. 
What right have I to assume that this 
wealth concentrated in my hands will be 
more charitably disbursed than if it re- 
mained scattered?” 

“Suppose you were to find yourself suddenly 
possessed of a hundred millions tomorrow,” 
Douglass asked, “what would you do?” 

“I would divest myself of the surplus at 
once,” Harrison answered without hesitation. 
“It would make no change in my life further 
than a brief annoyance in getting rid of it. In 
proof of my sincerity, if any is needed, I may 
say that I am already possessed of ample 
means, and that if I chose to do so, I could go 
where I liked and change my manner of liv- 
ing entirely. I am content here, and no sum 
of useless money could by its mere enormity 
change either my views or my life.” 

“That is remarkable,” Douglass said. 


WHILE THE ROAD WAS MENDING 97 


“That, sir, is exactly what it is not. It is 
the healthy and normal view. I merely exer- 
cise the same faculties with which nature en- 
dowed the chipmunk.” 

But Douglass enjoyed Harrison’s conver- 
sation most keenly when he talked about his 
daughter and her education. 

“After her Mother died,” Harrison said, “it 
was my intention to take the child and go back 
to civilization at once. The physician whom 
I had brought here warned me not to attempt 
the trip with her for some months, so I stayed 
on and on, and, contented as I myself was, a 
desire grew upon me to see what effect a per- 
fectly normal life and education would have 
upon a child. When she grew old enough to 
understand, I often asked her if she wished to 
leave the island, but she seemed surprised, and 
even cried lustily at the mere idea. Later, 
when she began reading, she expressed a de- 
sire to go to the little town, and I took her, 
but she did not care to repeat the trip. Her 
isolation here has been no drawback to her 
good taste. I think you will find more gawks 
and greenhorns in a city than elsewhere. She 
dresses as she likes, and pays what she likes 
for the materials she orders. I venture to say 
that if she were to be transplanted to a city 
tomorrow, it would not be a week till she 
would be in full harmony with her surround- 


98 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


ings. Gawkiness is more a matter of indi- 
viduality than of locality.” 

“She is the most perfect specimen of a 
healthy and beautiful mind and body I have 
ever known,” said Douglass. 

Harrison flushed with pleasure. “It grati- 
fies me very much to hear you say so,” he said 
simply. 

“She doesn’t seem to be afraid of anything,” 
Douglass added. 

“She has not been educated to fear things. 
I have chosen her books, and little of the grew- 
some, superstitious, or false has fallen into her 
hands. She has been taught self-reliance. 
When she was a child I never punished her, 
consequently she never learned to deceive me. 
Many parents make liars of their children by 
frightening them. The child, committing some 
indiscretion, fears punishment, and naturally 
shields itself with a lie.” 

Harrison paused for a time and then smiled 
reflectively : 

“When she was ten years old, she went out 
one day on the Wild-cat trail, the one you 
came in over. She was strong and healthy, 
and having little to carry, pushed on too far. 
Night fell and I grew worried. I had often 
warned her that if she was ever benighted on 
the trail never to try to follow it after the light 
had failed, but to camp where she was till 


WHILE THE ROAD WAS MENDING 99 


morning. I was confident my instructions 
would be obeyed, but nevertheless I was wor- 
ried. I took a bulls-eye lantern and went half 
way along the trail before I found her. She 
had stuck to the trail till the light grew dim, 
and then had made a little bed of balsam 
boughs and lay on it sleeping sweetly. The 
remains of her little campfire, and the bones of 
fish showed me that she had not fasted. Do 
you know what I did then?” 

“A wakened her and carried her home, I pre- 
sume.” 

“That was my first instinct, but I did not fol- 
low it. If I had showed her that I was fright- 
ened about her my fear would have been com- 
municated to her. Possibly if such a thing 
occurred again, she would attempt to relieve 
my anxiety and her own fears by pushing on. 
So I came home and left her lying there. I 
knew it was all right. The next morning she 
returned full of her experience, and I praised 
her for her action.” 

“She is a wonderful girl,” Douglass said, 
“and has had a unique education.” 

“She is, as I said, fearless and self-reliant, — 
a perfectly normal child.” 

That evening after supper, when their cigars 
had been lighted, Harrison said to his daughter : 

“Mary, you haven’t sung for me for several 
days.” 


100 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


“I have been so busy with our guest and 
you, I haven’t thought of it. I’ll go sing to 
both of you now.” Then to Douglass : ‘'Do 
you want to hear me sing?” 

“Yes, indeed, Lady Mary.” 

She ran lightly from the room and disap- 
peared in the darkness. A little later her clear, 
sweet voice was borne to them from far out on 
the lake singing “Schubert’s Serenade.” 

“She has the true artist’s spirit,” her Father 
said when the song was finished, and then 
sighed a little. “It is her Mother’s blood; I 
believe the mother’s blood is always predomi- 
nant.” 

“I don’t agree with you entirely; she has 
many of your traits.” 

Harrison looked at him strangely, and then 
said hastily : 

“Traits, yes, but they are only imitations, 
not instinct. Her Mother sang very beauti- 
fully, and had the same artistic spirit which 
Mary displays in 'singing from her canoe in- 
stead of in the room. The mother’s blood is 
predominant in us all for good or evil.” 

‘I am not so sure of that; I have known bad 
men with good mothers.” 

Certainly, but not many good men with 
bad mothers.” 

“Take my half-breed guide,” Douglass said; 
“his mother, he tells me, was a full-blood 


WHILE THE ROAD WAS MENDING 101 


squaw, yet he has as little of the Indian in 
him as you or I.” 

“There are good squaws,” Harrison replied. 
“And, again, you have had no chance to see 
the truth yet. Mark my words, his mother’s 
blood is strong in him, and if the occasion ever 
arises when he is called upon to display it, you 
will see my theory justified.” 

Douglass laughed. “I hope it won’t come,” 
he answered. 

That night as he reviewed the discussions of 
the day, Douglass told himself that his host 
was right about the money. Thoughts of 
money carried his mind back to Bruce. His 
animosity was waning in the novelty of chang- 
ing scenes, and the rejuvenation of his shat- 
tered body. Nevertheless, he had promised 
Bruce that he would cry quits with him, and 
he had no intention of abandoning the idea. 
He decided that some time he would lay the 
whole matter before Harrison and see what 
his ideas were. He had views on most sub- 
jects; it would be interesting to know what he 
thought on this one. 

He wondered what Harrison’s story was. He 
well knew that there was something untold. 
On most subjects his host talked freely and 
frankly, but he had never mentioned the events 
which had brought him to the island, and 
Douglass, of course, did not broach the subject. 

Also he thought of Mary. 


CHAPTER X. 


The King Starts for His Kingdom. 

The ten days that elapsed before George re- 
turned passed very quickly for Douglass. He 
constantly found new interest in his host, who 
showed a versatility of thought and action 
which was astonishing. Everything seemed to 
interest him, but his research and experiment 
never carried him to the realm of impossibili- 
ties. He was interested in abstruse problems, 
but spent no time in trying to square the circle. 
When he tired of his books and problems, he 
went to his well-appointed carpenter j shop and 
worked at anything that occurred to him, but 
he did not attempt to construct perpetual mo- 
tion machines. 

“There is much disappointment in attempt- 
ing to solve or understand what lies beyond 
the limits of the human intellect,’ 1 he said to 
Douglass, “yet those limitations are clearly 
enough defined. Wherever we find a wide dif- 
ference of opinion among savants and scholars 
of all ages, we may decide at once that no 
provable answer to the question on which they 
differ has ever been found. When a correct 
explanation of a certain matter, the rotundity 
of the earth, for example, is offered, we find 


102 


KING STARTS FOR HIS KINGDOM 103 


that it is soon accepted universally. But when 
we review the question of the secret of exist- 
ence and find a thousand jarring theories we 
may be sure no correct solution has ever been 
reached.” 

“Then you have no theory of your own on 
that subject?” 

“No, I do not believe it is intended that we 
should know. If it were the wish of the cre- 
ator that I should be able to grasp the mean- 
ing of space and time, it would have been made 
clear to me. A limitation has been placed in 
every branch of learning and discovery. Up 
to this point, thousands proceed, some rapidly, 
some haltingly, but they reach a bar at last, 
and from that point all efforts are abortive. 
In mathematics, for example, we go smoothly 
along, finding rules and solutions easily, and 
then bring up roundly at the quadrature of the 
circle. The more ambitious ones strive to go 
on, but they accomplish nothing. We study 
anatomy, we dissect the body and name all 
its parts and muscles ; we know the functions 
of the heart, the brain, the blood — all these 
things ten thousand men learn and agree on, 
but the greatest student, the greatest scholar 
can give no explanation of life itself.” 

“Nor of death.” 

“It is much the same thing; I think the most 
contorted idea of the ages has been, and is the 


104 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 

fear of death. It is as natural to die as to be born, 
and the fear arises largely from bad education 
and strained thinking. Properly attuned, man 
would look forward to dissolution with equa- 
nimity. I do not speak of violent nor prema- 
ture deaths, — they are hideous, because un- 
natural. And after all, the worry and fear of 
death finds its own fallacy in old age. The 
nearer man comes to the end of his natural 
span, the less he fears the end. I believe that 
often he comes, not to abhor it, but to feel the 
need of it.” 

“That is a consoling view.” 

“There is a greater and more consoling one, 
— the plain sound realization that it is all right. 
The birth and death of man are as natural as 
the budding and dropping of a rose. When 
the false and artificial fear of death comes to 
man, he has but to say cheerfully, ‘it’s all right, 
I know it must be all right/ To look on death 
without qualms is natural, to look at it other- 
wise is morbid. The very nomenclature is bad : 
‘the valley of the shadow/ ‘the Stygian shore/ 
‘the worm and the winding sheet/ are all terms 
calculated to convey terror to the unphilosoph- 
ical mind.” 

“And how has this view afifected your daugh- 
ter?” 

“She is a proof of the theory. No supersti- 
tion, morbidness, nor fear has ever touched 


KING STARTS FOR HIS KINGDOM 105 

her. I doubt if she ever thinks about it at 
all.” 

“Suppose you were to die, would it not 
grieve her greatly?” 

“That is beside the question ; we are not dis- 
cussing the pain of parting from loved ones. 
If I left her for a year she would weep ; if for- 
ever, she would weep still more, — it is a mat- 
ter of degree.” 

“My question was an unfair one, I admit. I 
would like to ask you another question. Do 
you think the world is growing better or worse 
as it grows older?” 

Harrison straightened up from his work and 
said : 

“Sir, it is growing better, slowly but surely. 
Its progress is gauged by the development of 
the human intellect. One by one the evils are 
dying out. We can look back a few centuries 
upon barbarities and horrors ; today we find 
evils, but in a lesser degree. In centuries to 
come, the greater evils will be remedied until 
a fair state of civilization is reached.” 

“Do you think the reformers are accomplish- 
ing much good?” 

“They are accomplishing something, but not 
in the way they usually intend. They are edu- 
cating the masses. The schemes and hopes 
which they promulgate for the sudden over- 
throw of evil are but a dream. To cure in- 


106 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


herent evils and passions by laws and regula- 
tions is impossible. As I said, the develop- 
ment of the intellect alone can bring society to 
an ideal state. When the reformers point out 
clearly certain evils, they aid in educating their 
unthinking brethren, and so, much good is 
done. Take the question of undue accumula- 
tion of wealth, for instance; all the socialistic 
laws and schemes will prove inadequate until 
people learn to look upon the dishonest and 
avaricious man as a creature to be shunned, 
not envied. Reform movements are merely 
evidences, out-croppings of the intellectual ad- 
vance, — they are the visible proofs that we are 
progressing. To consider for an instant that 
they are the cause of advancement is simply to 
say The engine drives the steam.’ ” 

“You think the time will come when avarice 
will be considered truly a vice, and the rich 
miser shunned?” 

“It is coming now,” Harrison said, extending 
his hand and pointing across the lake. “Yon- 
der in the world you will find it, in the books, 
in the hearts and tongues of a thousand wise 
men. The power of money is still great, but 
it is slowly dying. Men will some day know 
that enough is more wholesome than a feast. 
I have no patience, however, with writers and 
expounders who try to formulate plans for 
reducing all men to a dead level. We will 


KING STARTS FOR HIS KINGDOM 107 


always have our millionaires and our paupers. 
We can never set all intellects and all abilities 
to the same clock. The extremists, however, 
are legion; they are not content to attempt to 
keep men within their rights, they want to 
make them conform to a petty standard of 
mediocrity set by themselves. One would pre- 
vent me from accumulating money to gratify 
my tastes, another would have me eat no meat, 
yet another would bar me from amusing my- 
self at a pleasant game played with harmless 
bits of pasteboard, because men misuse cards 
by gambling with them. The principle in the 
last case is as if you said to me: ‘The dove is 
a wicked bird: men wager how far and how 
fast it can fly/ ” 

Mary, who had been on a lone expedition, 
came tripping up the beach with her arms filled 
with flowers, lilies and wild roses. 

“What are you talking about ?” she asked. 

“We are discussing questions of state, Lady 
Mary,” Douglass replied. 

“Really, well, I’ve decided that you’re not to 
ask Father for my hand.” 

“Indeed? Then I’ll make war on you as 
soon as my standing army returns from clear- 
ing the trail.” 

“Splendid! He can chop down the port- 
cullis and scale the battlements and rescue me 
from the ogre. Father, you will have to be the 


8 


108 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


ogre,” she cried, sitting on his knee and rum- 
pling his hair until it hung about his 
eyes. 

The two men laughed heartily, and Harrison 
said : 

“Why have you decided not to give King 
Douglass your hand?” 

“He must do some gallant deed first; what 
have you ever done to earn such a reward?” 
she said to Douglass. 

“Well, I killed two ducks, and I spilled you 
out of the boat. Can’t we pretend that the 
two ducks were enemies and that I rescued 
you from a watery grave?” 

She laughed merrily and flung her truant 
locks back from her eyes. 

“No, that won’t do, even for a make-believe. 
You must do something tremendous. Of 
course,” she said musing, “the ogre might lock 
me up and you might come and steal me, — I 
couldn’t help it if you stole me,” she said 
archly. 

“Well, I’ll leave you to discuss your plans,” 
Harrison said, rising. “I’ve got some work to 
do. I warn you not to steal her, King Doug- 
lass, she is no end of a little shrew.” 

When he was gone, Mary sat looking smil- 
ingly at Douglass for a time, then she said sud- 
denly : 

“How old are you?” 


KING STARTS FOR HIS KINGDOM 109 


“Forty.” 

“Oh, dear !” she sighed thoughtfully, and 
despite the little tug at his heart strings, Doug- 
lass broke into a ringing laugh. 

“You’re always laughing at me,” she cried; 
“you’re an ogre, too, I don’t believe you’re 
forty, you act just like a big overgrown boy.” 
Then stepping quickly behind him she rum- 
pled his hair as she had her Father’s and ran 
laughing to the cabin. 

* * * * * * 

George returned that night and reported 
the trail clear. 

“I’ve found a short cut,” he said; “there’s a 
creek that you can put into about half way 
across. I cut a path to it from the main trail.” 

“How long will it take us to go in?” 

“One day. If we leave here early we will 
be at Lost Lake for supper.” 

Douglass reflected. He was loath to go: 
he realized that he wanted to be near these 
people, that he cared more for them both 
already than he did for anyone back there in 
the world. He was beginning to enjoy life 
keenly, and he saw that it was partly because 
he was with congenial people. He was bet- 
ter satisfied with himself than he had ever been 
before. The selfish grind of his old life did not 
appeal to him. As for the whiskey, he had 


110 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


come to realize that it had no part in his new 
existence. He wondered if the craving for it 
would return when he went back to town. He 
knew he would go back some day, but there 
was no hurry, — he would not go until he tired 
of the woods. He turned to Harrison : 

“I believe I’ll build a cabin on Nobody’s 
Island and be neighbors with you for a while,” 
he said. 

Mary began clapping her hands as soon as he 
had uttered the first few words, and when he 
finished she cried out joyfully: 

“Oh, yes, please do, and don’t go away for 
ever so long.” 

“You can easily do that,” Harrison said with 
a look of genuine pleasure on his face. “I have 
a man of all work who can help you. He is in 
St. Paul now, but I will send him over as soon 
as he returns, which will be in about a week. 
You will enjoy the work hugely, more than I 
can tell you.” 

“Well, it’s decided; I’ll do it.” 

“You must have a house-warming when you 
finish your abode,” Harrison said. “This young 
mischief and I will come over and help dedi- 
cate the place.” 

As Douglass walked on the beach that even- 
ing reflecting on his plans, the little forest 
maiden came quietly beside him, and slipping 
her arm through his, walked with him. 


KING STARTS FOR HIS KINGDOM 111 


“Fm so happy,” she said, smiling up into 
his face. “We will enjoy having you near us 
so much, Father and I.” 

He was touched, and a trifle embarrassed. 
He thrilled a little as he looked down into her 
beautiful, earnest face, for she was less a child 
than a woman now. 

“It is really to be near you both that I am 
staying,” he said. 

She laid her other hand upon his arm and said 
again that she was happy. 

“You are always happy, Lady Mary, you enjoy 
everything in the world.” 

“Yes, I do, I do. Father says it is because I 
am normal and healthy. I was never sick a day 
in my life. I love to tramp in the woods, to 
paddle my canoe, to work and to sleep, and, most 
of all, I love to talk and eat. Now you’re laugh- 
ing again.” 

sf: * * * * * 

Harrison and Douglass and George talked late 
that night of the plans for the new cabin. Harri- 
son drew sketches and suggested ideas and made 
a list of tools they must be sure to take from 
his workroom. He grew almost boyish in his 
enthusiasm as they progressed, and Douglass 
entered into the plans with like spirit. Before 
they went to bed they had projected schemes and 
fixtures enough to cover an acre of ground, but 


112 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


that did not detract from the pleasure of the 
visions. 

The next morning bright and early they took 
their leave. The men shook hands heartily and 
talked of their next meeting. Mary came up to 
Douglass quietly and said, “Good bye, I like you 
better than any one I ever knew except my 
Father.” 

Then very simply, very naturally, she came 
close to him and turned her face up for him 
to kiss. 

On the further shore Douglass turned and 
looked back. The white-haired man was standing 
with his arm about his daughter’s waist, and 
they both waved their hands to him as he 
plunged into the forest. 


CHAPTER XI. 


Nobody's Island. 

Wilson’s description of Lost Lake had inter- 
ested Douglass, but it had not led him to expect 
too much. His observation had led him to be- 
lieve that all lakes in this region looked pretty 
much alike. Therefore exaggerated expecta- 
tions did not mar his first view of it. 

They came upon it in the evening. The canoe, 
winding along the devious course of the river, 
slipped quietly out upon its placid waters, and 
Lost Lake and Nobody’s Island lay before them. 

The lake was circular in shape and about a 
mile in diameter. In the centre was a little 
island, also circular in form, consisting of about 
ten acres of ground covered with a heavy growth 
of brush and giant trees. 

The sun was just sinking behind the trees as 
they came upon the lake, and its rays, broken by 
the dense verdure, fell around the canoe in a 
million flecks of gold. There was no wind, not a 
ripple stirred the surface, and the dead sheet of 
water was like a great dark mirror set in a frame 
of green pines. 

The guide stopped his paddle as they left the 
river, and they now lay motionless a few yards 


113 


114 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


from the shore. The whole scene was to Douglass 
exquisitely beautiful and infinitely peaceful. He 
had noted before, since he had left town, how 
strange absolute silence is to the man who has 
never experienced it. We think sometimes, we of 
the 'town, that we know what silence is, but there 
is noise always. In the dead of night there is 
a constant hum ; we cannot distinguish its com- 
ponent parts, we cannot tell even that it exists, 
but let it once stop and its absence would be 
keenly perceptible. 

It seemed to Douglass now that there was in 
this overwhelming quietude some hint, some 
suggestion of the mighty power that swings the 
world noiselessly through space. The thought 
was dim, incomprehensible, born not of words, 
nor of logic, but of silence, and with a sense of 
self-abnegation he had never known before, he 
quietly, unconsciously bared his head. 

The spell lasted but a moment. A tiny silver 
fish leaped joyfully near the canoe, and, as if 
that little splash were the signal to return to 
earth, Douglass sighed, and George drove the 
paddle into the water. 

They reached the island just as dusk was 
falling. Douglass could scarcely wait for day- 
light to examine his domain, but was forced to 
content himself sitting in the little tent with 
George, making plans for the morrow. 


NOBODY’S ISLAND 


115 


At daybreak they were stirring. Axes and 
saws were laid out, a site for the cabin was 
selected, measurements were made, and with a 
will they set about clearing the space. 

Douglass had decided to gradually cut away 
•the trees and brush till nothing was left but a 
wall of verdure about the edges of the island. 
This would give him a circular park fenced 
around with the natural woodland growth. The 
larger trees they cut would serve for the cabin, 
the brushwood they would burn when the clearing 
should be large enough to make it safe to do so. 

Following Harrison’s advice, he gave himself 
no concern about the furnishing as yet, except 
to keep a list of things that would be needed, as 
they occurred to him. 

The plans roughly formulated, they set to work. 
Douglass had made up his mind to have a part 
in all that was accomplished, and he swung his 
axe vigorously, careless of his blistering hands. 
The smaller trees they chopped down, the larger 
ones were felled with the two-handed saw they 
had brought in from Harrison’s. Douglass 
tugged and perspired at this instrument of torture 
until his back ached and his arms grew numb. 
But each day’s work was easier than the day 
preceding, and now and then in the evening he 
rolled back his shirt sleeves and fingered the 
growing and hardening muscles of his arms 
with satisfaction. In a few days his hands ceased 


116 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


to blister and his back to ache. While he worked 
he sang. It was not a very good song, nor was 
it very well sung, but it was a song nevertheless, 
the only one that memory had retained from his 
impoverished youth. The half-breed soon caught 
the refrain, and as they bellowed it lustily to- 
gether, they kept time with the strokes of their 
axes. 

The pile of notched logs grew daily, and the 
space in the centre of the island gradually 
widened. In -ten days they made an estimate 
and decided that they had enough logs for a 
two-room cabin. Then they began “hewing out,” 
shaping the logs flat for the floors. This proved 
a tedious job; making boards in a primitive way 
is a slow operation. There is nothing so precious, 
nor so scarce, in the woods as a board. 

The task completed, they laid and propped 
their floors on the solid trunks which they had 
sawed to equal heights on the cabin site, and 
waited the advent of Harrison’s half-breed, for 
they would need three men for the “rolling up.” 
He came the next day, and the walls began slowly 
rising. In two days the walls were up, and next 
the roof logs were rolled into place, and the heavy 
work was over. It only remained to make the 
doors and windows and fire-place, then thatch 
the roof, and the cabin would be complete. 

Douglass walked around the clean, solid 
structure and admired it, then he went inside 


NOBODY’S ISLAND 


117 


and admired it; then, coming out, he walked 
down to the beach and strolled carelessly back 
through the trees to see what the effect was 
when it burst suddenly upon the vision. From 
every point of view it was perfection. He felt 
very sure that there had never been quite as 
handsome and substantial a log cabin in the 
world before, and for him there never had been, 
for he had helped to build it with his own hands. 

As they occurred to him, he made a list of the 
things he wanted, tools, nails, kitchen utensils, 
canned goods, bedding and a hundred and one 
things, and it was decided that George and 
Harrison’s half-breed, who gave his name as 
“Mac” and considered that as all-sufficient, 
should go at once to Manitowish and fetch them. 

“Meanwhile I’ll exercise my ingenuity with 
such tools as I have and make some furniture,” 
Douglass said. “How soon can you get back?” 

“Three days,” Mac answered, “if George he 
can go through the trails as fast as I can and 
carry as big a pack.” 

“George he can go faster than you can and 
carry a bigger pack,” that individual modestly 
responded, and Mac grinned expansively. 


CHAPTER XII. 


A Warning. 

George and Mac set out at daybreak of the 
fifteenth day on Nobody’s Island. Douglass felt a 
little lonesome at first, but he knew the cure — 
he must keep busy. The first day of their absence 
he constructed a four-post bedstead of straight, 
clean saplings, heaped it with balsam boughs and 
slept on it that night. The next day he made 
two chairs and hewed out logs for a table. The 
work progressed rapidly and well, and he admired 
his productions as much as he had admired the 
cabin. He did not get very lonesome, for his 
tasks occupied his mind, and at night he was 
too tired to do anything but sleep. Nevertheless, 
he knew that if it were not for his work he 
would grow discontented in an hour, and even 
when he was fully occupied he knew that the 
presence of a companion, if only a half-breed, 
was a great boon. There never yet was a man 
so self-sufficient, or so crabbed, that he did not 
feel the need of at least one companion. Two 
men might live on a desert island and be bitter 
enemies, and go about their tasks in silence, but 
take one away and the other would be very 
lonesome. 


118 


A WARNING 


119 


On the morning of the third day, when 
Douglass awoke, his first thought was that he 
was glad his men would be back that evening. 
When he had dressed he threw open his door 
and stood for a minute filling his lungs with the 
clean, pine-laden air. He decided that he would 
catch a fish for breakfast and stepped back into 
the cabin to get his lines. As he did so his eye fell 
upon something lying on the door-sill. It was a 
white envelope with the superscription upward. 
He stared stupidly at it. How in the world had 
it come there? For a long time he stood looking 
at it like Robinson Crusoe at the footprint in 
the sand. Then he picked it up. It was addressed 
to him in a scrawling, half-printed hand. He 
turned it over and looked at the back, as if 
to gain some intelligence from that. Then it 
occurred to him that perhaps George had returned 
and left it there ; but no, there was only one canoe 
on the beach, the one they had left for him. 

At length he tore it open, and on the single 
sheet of paper it contained, in the same hand as 
the address, he read : 

“You’re not wanted here. If you are in the 
Manitowish Waters one week from to-day, you 
will never leave them alive. This means business.” 

He stared at the message in blank surprise, for 
there was no signature. It was a thunderbolt 
from a clear sky. He sat down to think the matter 
over calmly. 


120 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


That some one had visited him in the night 
and thrust the letter under the door was a 
certainty. Who was it? He went over each 
acquaintance he had made since his arrival at 
State Line. Kaufman was out of the question; 
Wilson had reason for dislike, but this letter 
showed a plain desire on the part of the writer 
not to injure him, but to drive him from the place. 
If Wilson harbored resentment this would not 
be the natural way to show it. It could not be a 
joke or test from Harrison or his daughter— 
they were not that sort; George, he knew he 
could trust, and George could account for Mac. 
He turned and twisted the problem a hundred 
ways, but could find no solution. 

Then he went out and examined the island 
carefully — no one there; he could find no clue 
to his nocturnal visitor. Returning to the cabin 
he sat down and read the message again. 

“It’s no joke,” he said; “people don’t make 
trips at night to such spots as this for a joke. 
What the devil does it mean?” 

He thought perhaps George could throw 
some light on it, and decided to lay the matter 
before him on his return. Then he kept it from 
his mind as best he could, and went about his 
work. 

The two men returned just at nightfall; they 
opened the packs and soon all three were busy 
examining the contents. The pleasure of the 


A WARNING 


121 


operation was marred for Douglass by the matter 
on his mind, and George looked at him curiously 
once or twice, shrewdly detecting a change in 
his manner. 

Douglass said nothing until they had had 
supper and Mac had retired to the tent where 
the men still slept. George was preparing to do 
the same when Douglass called him, and taking 
the lantern from its hook, handed it and 
the letter to him, briefly detailing the in- 
cident of finding it. 

The half-breed read the scrawl with a surprise 
that left no lingering doubt in Douglass’s mind 
as to his ignorance of the writer. 

“What do you make of it?” the half-breed 
asked, handing it back. 

“Nothing at all ; I thought you might give me 
an idea.” 

George looked at him quickly. “You don’t 
think ” 

“Of course not, I’d trust you to the limit.” 

He looked gratified and began studying. 
Douglass knew that he was going over the same 
mental ground as he had himself traversed so 
carefully, and said : 

“It wasn’t Kaufman, nor Wilson, nor Harri- 
son, nor you, nor Mac.” 

“No, it wasn’t Mac, he was with me every 
minute, and he ain’t that kind. He likes you and 
he’s all straight. You can size a man up pretty 


122 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


well on three days of bad trails. I can’t think of 
any one but that Wilson.” 

“But if he wanted to injure me he wouldn’t 
give me warning; he could kill me from the 
trees and no one be the wiser. The writer of 
this simply wants me to get out, and wants that 
so heartily that he threatens to kill me if I 
don’t go.” 

“Are you going?” 

Douglass flushed. “Not by a damn sight,” 
he said. “If I’d had my pack ready to leave 
when I got this note, I’d have begun pulling the 
ropes off.” 

“I thought so,” George said quietly. “I’ll be 
right here with you, and I’ll keep my eyes open.” 

Douglass extended his hand without a word. 
If the blood of this man’s mother was predom- 
inant, Douglass thought, there must be some 
mighty good traits about the Indian. 


CHAPTER XIII. 


The Spring Gun. 

With a philosophical spirit which had always 
stood him in good stead, Douglass decided to 
make no change in his daily routine because of 
the warning he had received. He argued cor- 
rectly that the danger, if any existed, would not 
appear until the expiration of the time set for 
his departure. There was obviously no solution 
of the matter to be had, and he cautioned George 
to make no mention of the letter to Mac. He 
did not care to have the story go abroad ; it might 
come to nothing, and if so, he would not have 
it appear that he had been greatly disturbed. 

So they went on with their work, and soon 
the interior of the cabin began to assume an air 
of completeness. Mac left them when the heavy 
work was done, but returned within a day or two 
with a load of books and papers, a gift from 
Harrison. He reported that Mary had asked a 
great many questions, and had been particularly 
anxious to know when the projected house- 
warming was to take place. 

Douglass sent her a grandiloquent scroll, done 
on birch bark, with the great seal of Nobody's 
Island in the corner, informing her that his court 


9 


123 


124 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


would be ready to do her honor in two weeks. 
His real reason for delaying the invitation was 
to see what would come of his strange warning. 

The seven days within which he was to leave 
the island came and went. The last day was a 
trying one ; to say that he passed it without worry 
would be a ridiculous statement. A man who can 
face danger without fear is usually a fool; the 
man who does not know what fear is deserves 
no credit for his bravery. To be brave is to 
recognize danger and face it with determination 
and calmness, and Douglass faced the trying 
period bravely. 

When the seventh day had passed he breathed 
easier. On the eighth day he began to laugh 
at his fears. “It was either a hoax or a bluff,” 
he said to George. 

George made no reply — his state of mind was 
not so easy, and while he kept his own counsel, 
he was greatly perturbed, for, unknown to 
Douglass, the seventh day had witnessed an 
event which had menaced him with death. It 
happened in this wise : 

On the night of the seventh day, after the 
receipt of that mysterious missive, George, sleep- 
ing in his tent, was awakened about midnight by 
a thunder-shower. He remembered that he had 
left his coat in the canoe, and rising, went to 
the beach to fetch it. As he returned toward the 
cabin, a flash of lightning threw a faint light on 


THE SPRING GUN 


125 


the door, and before it he saw something that 
made him stop short, amazed. It was a rifle, set 
on two forked twigs, pointing straight to the 
door. He knew at once what it meant, and, 
walking carefully and quietly to the spot, he felt 
cautiously for the hammer and lowered it. Then 
running his finger along the trigger guard, he 
slipped off the twine which he knew would be 
there, and feeling his way, followed it to the 
door hasp. He detached the string, laid the rifle 
on the ground and pulled up its two supports. 
Then, with his bare toes, he obliterated the holes 
where the pointed sticks had been pushed into 
the ground. Then he returned to his tent, put 
the whole paraphernalia under his mattress, and 
lay down to think. 

There was no question now but that the note 
meant business. The rifle had been so placed 
that when Douglass opened the door in the 
morning he would have been shot in the 
breast. 

George was a heavy sleeper, and almost in- 
variably was awakened by Douglass, who rose 
at dawn for a plunge in the lake. But for the 
providential shower, and George’s trip for his 
coat, Douglass would certainly have been shot. 
The half-breed saw at once that they were being 
watched; that whoever had placed the gun there 
had been aware of this early-rising habit of 
Douglass. 


126 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 

George slept no more that night, but lay 
turning the matter over in his mind, and debating 
what was best to do. It was clear that whoever 
this would-be assassin was, he must have been 
hiding in the woods and watching them. After 
long consideration he decided that it would do 
no good to tell Douglass of the episode, though 
this had been his first thought when he ob- 
literated the marks before the door and con- 
cealed the rifle. 

The first thing to do was to find out how 
and where the midnight visitor had come to the 
island, and where he had gone when he had left it. 

At dawn he took out the rifle and examined it ; 
it was a new one of the small, wicked calibre 
known as 30-30. He drew the single long car- 
tridge from its chamber and examined it; the 
bullet was of the kind known as “mushroom,” 
that is, the shank was made of hard metal and the 
nose of soft lead. This form of bullet is particu- 
larly deadly. When it strikes an object the soft 
metal flattens out with the impact, while the 
harder portion remains unchanged, forming a 
“mushroom’’ shape which tears a great, ragged 
hole. 

He replaced the gun under the mattress, and, 
pounding on the cabin door, called to Douglass 
that he was going out to look for a deer; then 
he took his own rifle and went to the beach. 
Before pushing off he examined the ground 


THE SPRING GUN 


127 


carefully and found what he expected, the mark 
made by the prow of a strange canoe. He paddled 
around the island — no other canoe on the lake. 
He now knew that the visiting canoe had either 
gone up the river or been pulled up the bank at 
some point. He was going to find that boat and 
its owner if he could. 

When he had circumnavigated the island he 
found Douglass puffing and splashing in the 
water near the beach. 

“You’re out early, George.” 

“Yes, I heard a deer in the lake in the night. 
I’m going to find where he went out and get him.” 

“Good, a venison steak will just about suit; 
we’re going to have company next week too.” 

George paddled away. He thought to himself 
that if Douglass knew of the company that had 
recently come and gone he would not be taking 
things so easy. He paddled to the bank and 
began slowly working around the lake, examining 
every foot of the shore. This took him until 
noon, when he returned for dinner. 

“Find him?” Douglass asked. 

“No, he didn’t leave by the bank, he went up 
the river.” 

He ate hurriedly and started out again, this 
time working up the stream, examining both 
banks with a practised eye. He followed the 
stream until a mass of fallen logs and brush 
marked the end of navigation. Then he rested 


128 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


and cogitated. He reasoned that the occupant of 
the canoe must have stepped out into the water 
and lifted the boat ashore, without leaving any 
visible traces on the bank. He paddled slowly 
back, watching the bottom for shallow spots, and 
he soon found what he sought, a shallow place 
with boot-marks in the clay bottom. He tied 
his own canoe to a sapling and went quickly 
ashore in the direction the footprints pointed. 
He shaped his course through the tangled under- 
growth along the line of least resistance. He 
knew from the character of the ground that the 
canoe could not have been carried far. He soon 
found it resting on one end against a tree. He 
examined it carefully — no clue there. Then he 
took out his knife and opened it, intending to 
destroy the boat, but he paused, studied for a 
moment, and replaced the knife in his pocket. 
Slipping quietly back into the brush he sat down, 
and sat there like a statue till nightfall. Then 
he went back to the cabin. 

“What luck ?” Douglass asked. 

“Bad; I found his sign, but couldn’t come 
up with him.” 

After supper George did some more thinking. 
At first he was inclined to tell Douglass the whole 
thing, but he had reasons of his own for chang- 
ing his mind. The next morning he said : 

“I want to go down to Manitowish for a day 
or two, if it’s all the same to you.” 


THE SPRING GUN 


129 


“All right, I was going to ask you to go over 
to Harrison’s in a few days anyhow and ask 
them to come over for a visit. I’ll write Harrison 
a letter and you can carry it with you.” 

After a little silence he added, “I guess the 
wild man of the woods was a bluffer?” 

“I don’t think he’ll bother you any more,” 
George replied. 

The next morning he started on the trail with 
the letter and his light pack. 


CHAPTER XIV. 


The Man in the Woods. 

The day after George’s departure Douglass 
busied himself arranging and rearranging the 
interior of his cabin. He wanted things to 
iook as imposing as possible when his guests 
arrived. As he viewed the disposal of his 
limited furnishings, and the appearance of the 
cabin, he said to himself that he had accom- 
plished a great deal in a month. Here was a 
place of habitation, a good substantial one, fur- 
nished with all the necessities of life, where, 
four weeks before, there had been but dense 
wood and underbrush. 

He sat down and figured the total cost — 
George’s work, Mac’s work, the things that 
had been purchased at Manitowish — all less 
than two hundred dollars. He laughed as he 
footed up the figures : he could live here a long 
time on what Bruce had left him. A million 
isn’t so great a necessity after all. 

Then his mind wandered back to his old life ; 
he wondered how long it would be before he 
returned to it. He thought of the half-sick, 
indifferent way he had gone through each day, 
mistaking apathy for calmness, and taciturnity 
for thought. He stood up straight and filled 


130 


THE MAN IN THE WOODS 


131 


out his chest. Then he bared his arm and felt 
the good firm muscles. He looked in the mir- 
ror at his eyes, — clear and bright, not red and 
heavy as of old. 

Physically there had certainly been a great 
improvement, and having approved of that 
change, he grew introspective. What had been 
the mental effect? 

First of all he admitted that he must have 
improved mentally: a sound body must have 
some effect upon the mind. He rehearsed to 
himself the habits of the old days, when he 
had dragged himself listlessly out of bed each 
morning, and then dragged himself listlessly 
through the day. He had been active enough 
mentally to scheme and reason and to make 
some money. How had it been possible? — 
when he looked back upon the last ten years 
they appeared to his clear, rejuvenated mind 
like a bad dream. He had gone through them in 
a mental haze, buoyed up by liquor, and work- 
ing, thinking and scheming like a machine, and 
he knew now that on that machine he had put 
a terrible strain, and that if he had strained it 
a little more it would have been wrecked, — 
high tension, high tension. He could sit down 
now and solve a problem or pursue a line of 
reasoning with ease; two months ago it would 
have left him with a racked brain and aching 
head. 


132 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


In that maelstrom where he had lived the 
best years of his life, the war-cry had been 
money, — clean money, dirty money, bloody 
money even, it mattered not. He could walk 
past a dozen groups of men on La Salle Street 
any time of the day, and be sure to catch one 
word always, “money.” Fraternity, charity or 
honor were unknown words in the lexicon of 
that busy thoroughfare. Honesty was there, 
written large, but there is a difference. “How 
much is he worth,” a man would ask in regard 
to some one under discussion, and by the 
answer, promptly given in dollars, the absent 
man was weighed, measured and placed. “He 
is a millionaire” carried much more weight 
than “he is a man of ability, integrity and 
honor,” and yet that art of accumulation is the 
simplest, most common of all the arts, for proof 
cf which we have only to observe the sort of 
men who master it before all other arts. Doug- 
lass remembered that on one occasion he had 
been opposed to an acquaintance in a wheat 
deal, and that the man had lost, and that when 
he met him on the street that afternoon he had 
nodded and smiled in a ghastly attempt to 
appear indifferent. Ten minutes later he was 
dead in his office, and the papers said that his 
family was destitute. 

And as he sat there alone on Nobody’s 
Island, a great nausea for that old fight for 


THE MAN IN THE WOODS 


133 


useless dollars seized him. He thought with 
contempt of that pushing, struggling, cursing 
mob out in the world there, shouldering each 
ether in a mad rush to a precipice ; lying, steal- 
ing, cheating for dollars, not that they might 
purchase bread or fine raiment, or even 
woman’s virtue or man’s honor, but that they 
might make them spawn and breed, or lock 
them in a box and let them rust. 

It was the game, not the money, in many 
cases. For himself, he knew it was the game: 
if he lost money he had been out-played, if 
he won, he was the best player. It was the 
game, and once played, no other hazard is great 
enough to be interesting. 

But even as he turned from all these things 
in disgust, his mind wandered back to Bruce. 
He didn’t care about the money, but he knew 
that one day he would go back and fight. He 
had been beaten with marked cards, and he 
would play again, with marked cards maybe, 
— it was to be dog eat dog. 

As he found himself drifting into this vin- 
dictive mood, he sprang up and ran down to 
the beach. He would take a long row in the 
canoe, and forget that old life and all con- 
nected with it. 

He paddled off, — he could handle a canoe as 
well as the next man now, — and out on the 
lake he began singing aloud, keeping time with 


134 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


the paddle. He remembered that he had seen 
some water-lilies up the river ; he thought he 
would go up and look at them now, for on the 
day that Lady Mary came, he wanted to get 
a huge bouquet and give them to her. He 
found the lilies, with lots of beautiful buds, 
and then decided that he would push on up 
the stream as far as he could go on a little ex- 
ploring expedition. So, still singing, he sent 
his canoe into the river. 

He soon reached the fallen logs and drift- 
wood which blocked the stream, and after a 
little aimless paddling about, turned the canoe 
and let it drift idly toward the lake. He 
lighted his pipe and puffed contentedly, hum- 
ming a snatch of his one song now and then, 
and occasionally striking the paddle into the 
water to keep the canoe on its course. 

He was thinking with pleasant anticipation 
of his guests, the white-haired friend he had 
gained, and the girl who was so unlike all 
other girls, when, as he swung around a sharp 
bend of the stream, he heard a crackling in the 
brush, a deer, no doubt, — too bad he hadn’t 
brought his rifle. He stopped the canoe quietly, 
fixed his eyes on the bank and listened intently. 

Then from the bank, not ten feet away, a 
shout rang out, followed almost instantly by 
a shot; he felt a sharp blow on his right side 
as if some one had struck him there with a 


THE MAN IN THE WOODS 


135 


rawhide whip, and looking down, saw blood 
pouring over his sweater. He heard another 
shout and a great crashing in the brush, and 
in another instant two men came rolling into 
the stream locked in each other’s arms. One 
of the men was George; the other, torn, dis- 
heveled, bearded as he was, he knew by the 
little, frightened close-set eyes — Wilson. Then 
everything blurred before him, he half rose in 
the canoe, toppled heavily to one side, and 
sank into the stream. 

****** 

When he recovered consciousness, he was in 
the cabin with George bending over him. 
Slowly he recalled the incidents of the after- 
noon. 

“Am I done for?” he asked, weakly. 

“No, I don’t think the wound is a bad one; 
I have dressed it. The ball went clear through. 
I have been waiting for you to come to so I 
could go for help. I’m going at once ; it’s hard 
to leave you here alone, but it’s the only way.” 

“How came you to be there?” 

“Don’t talk and I’ll tell you all about it.” 

Then as he moved about the cabin, prepar- 
ing to leave, the half-breed related what had 
occurred. Douglass noted that his voice was 
monotonous and his face expressionless, some- 
thing as the voice and face of an Indian might 
be. He had not gone to Manitowish, but had 


136 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


been watching the canoe in the woods. He 
had not told him of the trap-gun, nor of his 
vigil, as he had intended to kill the assassin out 
of hand and let the matter end there. Wilson 
had kept away from his boat, apparently sus- 
pecting something, but had been crawling 
toward it when he heard Douglass singing on 
the river. George could not see him, but had 
followed his movements by sound alone. He 
had, however, come close upon him, and caught 
sight of him just as he raised his arm to fire. 
The half-breed had uttered his shout of warn- 
ing and sprung upon Wilson, but too late. They 
had fallen together into the stream, and when 
George saw Douglass sinking he loosed his 
hold on Wilson and dragged the wounded man 
to the bank. Wilson had escaped, and George 
had made haste to fetch Douglass to the cabin. 
That was all. 

He finished his brief narration and his prep- 
arations for leaving at the same time. Then 
he came to the bed and said: 

“Can you use your right arm?” 

Douglass tried and found that he could. 

“I’ve put whiskey, and water, and this re- 
volver here on the table where you can reach 
them. It’s Wilson’s gun, he dropped it in the 
creek and I fished it out. He has no gun, and 
T’m going to stop on my way out and smash 


THE MAN IN THE WOODS 


137 


his canoe. There’s no danger, but I’m going 
to put the padlock on the door. I’ll have help 
here before morning.” 

“I’m not afraid,” Douglass said, “only 
hurry.” 

“I’m sorry I botched the job,” George said. 

Douglass smiled and held out his hand; his 
companion pressed it an instant, and was gone. 
Then the wounded man heard the lock snap on 
the door and knew he was alone. 

For a long time he lay quiet, thinking. He 
could not understand this man’s idea of re- 
venge. He remembered reading somewhere 
that revenge which left the victim in ignorance 
whence his injury proceeded was no revenge 
at all. Besides, the man had first warned him 
out of the woods. It could not be that he 
wanted to possess himself of the island, for that 
course would point him out as the slayer. It 
was a riddle, and he gave up thinking about it. 

An hour passed, and his body grew stiff; he 
tried to change his position, but a sharp pain 
in his side warned him to lie quiet. He knew 
that he must exercise all his philosophy and 
patience through that long night. He could 
move his arm freely, and he took a sip of 
water., The whiskey was there, too, but he 
would not touch that unless he grew faint. 

For many long, weary hours he lay there 
quietly, exerting all his will-power to keep his 


138 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 

mind calm and as much at ease as possible. 
He knew that properly directed mental action 
goes a long way in such a case. 

When he found his mind wandering to the 
horrors of the day, he turned it into other chan- 
nels. He solved problems in mental arith- 
metic, tried to repeat old poems of his school 
days, did everything to tire his mind and keep 
it from morbidness and alarm. It was a hard 
struggle, a killing struggle, but he made it 
manfully, and at last, long after midnight, he 
fell asleep. 

When he awakened the dawn was just break- 
ing. His head felt hot and heavy, and his 
mouth was parched. He reached for the water, 
then, with his hand in mid-air, he paused and 
listened. From somewhere in the room came 
a sound of deep, regular breathing. He laid 
his hand quietly on the revolver, and listened 
again. The regular breathing continued ; some 
one was asleep on the floor. He turned his head 
painfully and looked in the direction of the 
sound. Then a sense that something he had 
halLwished for, half anticipated, had come 
about, brought a smile to his face, and a sigh 
of relief to his heart. 

It was Lady Mary. 


CHAPTER XV. 


In the Valley of the Shadow. 

He spoke her name softly, and she awoke 
and smiled sleepily up at him; then, realizing 
where she was, she sprang hastily to her feet, 
and brushed the tumbled hair from her eyes. 
She came to the bed and took his extended 
hand in both of hers. 

“Fm a poor nurse,” she said; “I found you 
sleeping, and I lay down to rest a minute and 
went to sleep myself. How do you feel?’’ 

“Better for your being here, but pretty 
weak.” 

She laid her hand on his hot forehead, and 
he took it feebly in his own and carried it to 
his lips. 

“God bless you for coming, little Lady Mary. 
J had a feeling that you would come.” 

She smiled, but her eyes were wet with tears. 
Then she said in a low voice : 

“It was my fault that you were shot.” 

His active mind grasped the whole situation 
at once ; all the perplexities about Wilson were 
cleared away. He recalled the surly manner 
he had assumed on the subject of Harrison’s 
Lake when they first met at Kaufman’s. He 


10 


139 


140 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


loved the girl, and for some reason had looked 
upon Douglass as a rival. First he had tried 
to drive him away, and then to kill him. 

“I want to tell you all about it,” Mary con- 
tinued. ‘‘He came in on the Wild-Cat trail 
the day you left ; he saw you kiss me, and mis- 
understood. He has wanted me to marry him 
for a year. He came to the cabin and made a 
scene ; I was stubborn and didn’t tell him he was 
mistaken. Then he went away, I thought for 
good.” 

Her voice broke and she covered her face 
with her hands. 

Douglass reached up and gently drew her 
hands down and held both of them in his own. 

“Why, Lady Mary, you can’t blame yourself 
a bit, you mustn’t think of it again. I’m going 
to be all right in a few days — that is, I’ll prom- 
ise to get well if you’ll promise not to speak 
of the matter again.” 

Then swiftly it occurred to him that this 
madman was at large, and that if he knew of 
her presence there, his unreasoning jealousy 
might carry him to any lengths. The thought 
startled him. 

“Where is George?” he asked. “You didn’t 
come here alone?” 

“No, George was with me. He has not 
spoken a word since he told me of your 
trouble.” 


IN THE VALLEY OF THE SHADOW 141 


Douglass breathed a sigh of relief: “Where 
is your Father?” 

“He was in Manitowish when George came. 
Mac started for a doctor at once. They will 
all be here by this af ternoon ” 

“Do you think they can get a doctor to 
come here?” 

“Yes, there is a physician there who was 
with my Mother when she died; he has often 
been to the Island. I sent him a note. I am 
sure that he will come.” 

She laid her hand again upon his head. 

“You have a fever; please don’t talk any 
more. I have some medicines here.” 

He watched her as she moved quickly about, 
unstrapping the little pack she had brought in, 
and disposing its contents about the room. She 
was a woman now, the child was gone. 

She fixed a draught and brought it to him; 
then she rearranged the pillows and handed 
him the medicine. He saw that her face was 
very sorrowful. 

“I won’t take the medicine, and I won’t 
promise not to talk unless you bring Lady 
Mary back.” 

She made a brave attempt to smile and held 
the glass to his lips. He pushed it away. 

“Will you promise?” 

“Yes, anything, only please get well.” 

“I’ll be out in a week,” he said. 


142 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


The medicine made him drowsy and soon he 
sank into a troubled sleep. He dreamed of a 
little, bubbling spring where, in his boyhood, 
he had often slaked his thirst. The spring and 
all its environments had been long since for- 
gotten, but in his dream he lay at full length 
before it, drinking, drinking deeply, but it had 
no power to quench his thirst, and he woke at 
length, crying with parched lips for water. 

Lady Mary was beside him in an instant with 
a glass of water in her hand ; he drank it eager- 
ly ; she gave him medicine again and he felt 
easier, but his head was hot and heavy, and 
his body was racked with pain. She laid her 
cool hand on his forehead, and he murmured 
to her to keep it there. 

“How long did I sleep ?” 

“It is three o’clock; they will be here soon. 
Don’t talk, try to rest again.” 

He sank again into a stupor, muttering. con- 
stantly and unintelligibly. Then he awoke sud- 
denly and looked about him wildly. She was 
still by his side, and George was in the cabin. 
His face grew composed and he began talking 
to her in a low voice. She sank on her knees 
beside the bed, and the half-breed silently left 
the cabin. 

She called him back in a few minutes. 

“He is delirious,” she said, and he saw that 
her face was very white. 


IN THE VALLEY OF THE SHADOW 143 


“If a man was to die here on Nobody’s Isl- 
and, he’d have to be buried here ; they couldn’t 
get him out,” the sick man cried. “Well, why 
not?” 

He muttered to himself for awhile, and then 
laughed aloud. 

“Hello, Billy Matthews,” he cried. “No, I 
wasn’t bored up in the quiet woods, and I’ll 
agree with you, there is something bigger than 
a ten-dollar bill in the world. Yes, ” 

He fell to muttering again, and felt about the 
coverlet with his right hand. 

“Where the devil is that revolver? He might 
come here again. I’ll shoot between those nasty 
little eyes if he does. He shan’t hurt you, 
Lady Mary.” 

Then he became quiet and lay very still. 
The half-breed came to the bedside and looked 
at his face. Then he turned quickly to the girl. 

“He’s sinking; we must give him whiskey.” 

He poured a little in a glass, and she put her 
arm under his head and begged him to swallow 
it. He roused and took the whiskey, which 
seemed to revive him a little. 

“You must keep giving it to him a little at 
a time; don’t let him grow unconscious. I’m 
going out on the trail and see if I can hurry 
them. If I meet them I’ll call to you.” 

“Yes, go,” she cried. 


144 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


For an hour she knelt there beside him, her 
arm under his head, reviving him with the 
whiskey. She saw with terror that he w r as 
growing weaker, and that the liquor had less 
and less effect. She talked to him, begging 
him to hold up for a little longer, but he made 
no answer now. 

Another hour of alternate sinking and rally- 
ing, and she drew her breath with a great sob : 
the whiskey was almost gone. Then, far away 
in the woods, she heard a long shout. They 
were coming. 

She gave him the last of the whiskey, and im- 
plored him to try to hold himself together. He 
smiled feebly, and tried to answer her, but the 
words were unintelligible. Then he lapsed 
into unconsciousness again. There was a look 
on his quiet face which she could not mistake. 
She grew very calm then, and sat there, wait- 
ing, with her eyes on his face. Her lips did not 
move, but her heart repeated one word, hurry, 
hurry, hurry. 

She heard the quick beat of feet upon the 
path, and as the three men came into the room, 
she rose, swayed a little, and fell into her 
father's arms. 

The doctor, a tall, raw-boned, bearded man, 
more like a woodsman than a physician, moved 
quickly to the bedside, took one glance at 
Douglass’ face, picked up the nerveless hand, 


IN THE VALLEY OF THE SHADOW 145 


and without a moment’s hesitation took a 
hypodermic needle from his case and sent its 
contents into the wounded man’s arm. 

Mary recovered quickly and came at once to 
the bedside. 

“What have you given him?” the doctor 
asked. 

“Whiskey.” 

“Good, it has saved his life. That is, it may 
have saved it. All of you get out of here now ; 
your presence will only excite him. Close the 
door and darken the window. Harrison, go to 
sleep, — you, too, Mary. I don’t want to have 
too many patients on this island.” 

Mary looked at him appealingly. His rugged 
face softened and he said gently : 

“I can’t tell anything for a while.” 

Then they all obediently left the doctor and 
his patient alone, 

A few hours later the big man came out of 
the darkened room. Harrison was sleeping 
quietly upon the door ; George had disappeared. 
Mary came to him instantly, and he took both 
her hands in his. 

“It’s all right, baby,” he said, “I’m going to 
pull him through.” Then his rough face 
crinkled into a smile, and he looked at her 
shrewdly from beneath his bushy eyebrows, 
“I’m going to pull him through for you.” 


146 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


She made no pretense of misunderstanding 
him, but said: 

“You are mistaken; he is our friend, — noth- 
ing more; but I am so glad and so grateful to 
you.” 

“All right, all right. Wouldn’t have come 
for any one but the baby. Now I want a pan 
of cold water. George, — where’s that George?” 

But George was not to be found. 


CHAPTER XVI. 


A Problem. 

Under the skilful ministrations of his phy- 
sician and nurse, Douglass recovered rapidly. 
His wound was an ugly one, but the greatest 
danger had been from the fever, and his weak- 
ened condition from loss of blood. Within a 
week he was able to sit propped up in bed, and 
talk freely with his friends. About this time 
the doctor took his leave. 

Mac, who had come in with some food sup- 
plies the day after their timely arrival, was to 
escort the woodsman-doctor back to Mani- 
towish. Harrison, who was unremitting in his 
efforts to entertain and cheer the bed-ridden 
man, gave Mac a long list of books, papers, 
and delicacies to fetch with him on the return 
trip. 

"IPs only a question of two or three weeks 
now till you’ll be as good as new,” the doctor 
said. “You can thank the little girl here that 
I came in, or that I was of any use when I got 
here, for that matter.” 

Douglass held out his hand. “I’m thanking 
all of you every hour,” he said earnestly. Then 
after a little awkward silence he continued 


147 


148 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


with a touch of huskiness in his voice: “Fve 
lived in a different world from this of yours all 
my life. I don’t believe I ever knew what gen- 
erous, disinterested people there were on earth. 
God bless you all.” 

He saw that they were all embarrassed by 
his speech, but he was glad he had made it. 
No more was said on either side, and after 
leaving some instructions as to medicine and 
diet, the doctor left him. 

Harrison resumed the story he was reading 
to the sick man, and Mary went about her 
household affairs. 

Douglass had observed during his con- 
valescence that Lady Mary was still a woman, 
the child had never returned. She was cheer- 
ful, pleasant, helpful, but a little reserved, and 
sometimes, he imagined, a trifle sad. He puzzled 
over her demeanor; the change was apparently 
not perceptible to any one but him. He won- 
dered if she was embarrassed because she had 
shown so much solicitude for him while they 
were alone. 

He called her to the bedside when they were 
alone in the room one day and said : 

“What’s become of that little Lady Mary 
who was always laughing and singing?” 

She smiled brightly and left her hand in his. 

“Why, here she is, a little older, a little 
more subdued perhaps, because of the trouble 


A PROBLEM 


149 


her friend has had, but very, very happy that 
he is getting well again / 5 

“Getting well because of you , 55 he said. 

“I am so glad that I knew what to do, and 
that I could do it / 5 

“I was conscious part of the time, and I’ll 
never forget those long hours you knelt by 
my bed with your arm about my neck and kept 
death away / 5 

She blushed hotly ; he saw it, and said 
quickly : 

“You don’t feel embarrassed about that, Lady 
Mary ? 55 

“Oh no, no , 55 she said hastily. “I did what 
I could just as I would have done it for my 
Father . 55 

The reply did not please Douglass very well ; 
he felt a little twinge at his heart-strings, but 
said nothing more. 

She stood for a moment looking at him 
curiously, then she withdrew her hand from 
his and went about her duties. 

5{« 5jS >j« >|S ' 

One strange thing had occurred on Nobody’s 
Island : George had not returned after his 
sudden disappearance following the arrival of 
Harrison and the doctor. Douglass felt sure 
that he was again watching in the woods, but 
could not understand why he did not put in 


150 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


an occasional appearance. Mac was interro- 
gated as to the probable whereabouts of his 
companion, and after mature deliberation said 
briefly : “He has went away,” a statement so 
obvious as not to be considered important. 

* * * * * * 

The few books about the cabin were soon 
exhausted. Harrison did not read them all; 
he had a rare faculty for choosing what he 
knew was interesting to his hearer, and leav- 
ing out the rest. Also, Douglass preferred his 
conversation to the reading, and would fre- 
quently ask his opinion on some question to 
start him talking. He was sure of something 
out of the accepted line. One day Douglass 
sounded him on the occult, and he replied : 

“What is the use of trying to explain that 
which is inexplicable ? There are many simpler 
things which we do not understand, the investi- 
gation of which brings keen pleasure. A great 
many wonderful minds have been seriously 
handicapped through this striving for the un- 
attainable.” He picked up a volume of Poe’s 
works: “Here is a great instance of what I 
just said. Edgar Allan Poe possessed one of 
the most remarkably logical minds of which 
we have any record. An error in analysis or 
logic was at once apparent to him. Take, for 
example, 'The Mystery of Marie Roget,’ in 


A PROBLEM 


151 


which he takes a number of newspaper articles 
anent an actual murder, and shows up such a 
mass of contorted logic and ridiculous reason- 
ing as to make the story actually appear 
humorous. Then he proceeds to give a solu- 
tion of the mystery, a solution which was 
afterwards found to be correct in every detail. 
This, remember, w ( as an actual occurrence, not 
a tale, although his deductions appear in the 
form of a story. And yet this man shows 
through all his works a wild, half-mad striving 
for an understanding of what is not within the 
scope of the human mind, a defect which has 
rather marred than beautified his works, and 
certainly made him very unhappy. He looked 
upon a tree, and was not content to rest in its 
shade, nor even to stop at such details of its 
growth and development as can be examined 
and understood, — he -wanted to know what its 
life germ was; he never found out. His un- 
reasoning ambition ruined him, or at least 
handicapped him seriously for useful work. 
Imagine the sublime egotism of a man who 
tries to understand, for example, the duration 
of time, or the extent of space. He wastes his 
time and life in useless effort.” 

* * * * * * 

The fifth day after the physician’s departure 
Mac returned. He brought, among other 


152 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 

things, a bundle of newspapers ; one of them a 
Chicago daily, and as Douglass opened it, his 
eye fell on a pictured face he knew well — a 
face with cold, gray eyes, and a slit for a 
mouth. He rapidly read the text which ac- 
companied the picture. Bruce was in Chicago 
running a deal in wheat. After re-reading the 
article carefully, he laid the paper aside and 
fell into a brown study. For an hour he did 
not move except to fill his pipe. The mood and 
the intent expression of his face were the same 
as on that day when he had sat in his 
office and studied the tape. But there was 
something else in his thoughts now, something 
which helped him to arrive at a decision. At 
length, he said half-aloud, “I’ll do it; every- 
thing considered, it’s probably the best thing 
to do.” 

That evening he said to Harrison : 

“What do you think about speculation?” 

“Do you mean the moral or financial aspect?” 

“Financial. What are the requisites of suc- 
cess?” 

“It is a subject to which I have given a 
good deal of study, and from a practical stand- 
point I am tolerably well equipped to answer 
you. I followed speculation as a business for 
many years. I should say that the prime 
requisites were patience and thought. Specu- 
lators, as a rule, are not patient, and they sel- 


A PROBLEM 


153 


dom think correctly. The great army of ven- 
turers are imbued with the idea that the mar- 
ket is a machine, and spend their time study- 
ing its past action on the theory that it may 
be expected to repeat its performances.” 

Douglass asked several other questions, and 
knew from Harrison’s replies that he under- 
stood the subject thoroughly. He had opened 
the matter for the purpose of disclosing his 
plans in regard to Bruce, and this he presently 
did. 

He told the story of his deal in Rope and its 
outcome, and ended by stating that as soon 
as he was able to travel he intended to return 
to Chicago and try conclusions with the man 
again. 

When he had heard the story, Harrison was 
silent for a time. Then he said: 

“I am sorry to hear of this, partly for selfish 
reasons; we have grown to enjoy your com- 
pany very much. Aside from that, I fear that 
even victory will give little pleasure, and' on 
the other hand you have many chances for loss. 
As I understand it, you are going after revenge 
rather than money.” 

“Yes, I have begun to look upon money as 
less important than heretofore. I am deter- 
mined to play the game once more, how- 
ever. He is on my ground now, I was on 
his before.” 


154 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


“Is he not in a position to crush you by mere 
preponderance of capital? If he finds you op- 
posed to him could he not consider his own 
possibilities improved ?” 

“Suppose I trade on his own side, parallel 
his own operations?” 

“He would certainly find you a hindrance, 
and in that event he could dispose of you and 
fortify his own position by working against 
himself temporarily.” 

Douglass laughed. “That is all very true, 
but I intend concealing my operations from 
him.” 

“Change places with him; could he conceal 
his from you?” 

“No, I don’t think he could ; that’s a fact.” 

“You are on the dangerous ground of under- 
estimating his intellectual powers. If you are 
to outwit such a man as I assume this Bruce 
to be, you must be very careful.” 

“Thank you for the suggestion. Perhaps 
my plans are rather too simple. I shall study 
it over. I think, however, I have analyzed his 
plans to the letter.” 

“That will be a great help, but again, be very 
careful. The end of possibilities, the logical 
conclusion, is sometimes very obscure.” 

“I do not think that I have overlooked any 
possibilities.” 


A PROBLEM 


155 


Harrison reflected a few minutes, and then 
said : 

“Let me divert you for a moment, and inci- 
dentally show you how far away the last analy- 
sis may be. You have seen the game played 
with dice in which one player casts two dice, 
and then casts again for the number to repeat. 
If it repeats he has won; if the uppermost 
spots total seven he loses. What are his 
chances ?” 

Douglass figured for a time, and replied : 

“Why, I had never studied the matter, but 
I see now that seven would appear more fre- 
quently than any other number.” 

“Exactly; it is possible to make seven in six 
different ways, and the chances of all other 
numbers decrease each way from seven. Two, 
for example, can be made in but one way, and 
the same is true of twelve. Now I will ask you 
another question. Suppose you are casting with 
two dice and throw two sixes twice, what are 
your chances for throwing sixes at the third 
attempt?” 

“Why, exactly what they were at the begin- 
ning; the dice are inanimate things.” 

“Now you have made my illustration of log- 
ical conclusions for me. You have answered 
as ninety-nine intelligent men out of a hundred 
answer. You have followed the question just 
so far as it is obvious and provable, and your 


11 


156 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


last analysis leaves you in a dangerous error. 
The chances of casting sixes on the third at- 
tempt are greatly reduced.” 

“You surprise me.” 

“Let me reverse the question : Suppose you 
cast twice for sixes, unsuccessfully, have your 
chances for making them on the third cast been 
increased?” 

“I do not think so.” 

“Will you admit that sixes will appear some 
time?” 

“Certainly.” 

“How do you reconcile that admission with 
the belief that you have just expressed, that 
each unsuccessful cast brings you no nearer 
the some time when they will appear.” 

“Harrison,” Douglass said, “you make my 
head ache.” 

Harrison laughed. “I only want to show you 
the danger of a last analysis where you are 
pitted against a very brainy man. The proposi- 
tion I have just placed before you, you will be 
able to see for yourself if you give it careful 
thought, but if your attention had not been 
directed to it, you would have been positive of 
your former last Analysis.” 

“Has the question of the dice ever been 
agreed upon by logicians? I cannot yet believe 
the view correct.” 


A PROBLEM 


157 


“Oh, yes, it is in no way original with me. 
The man we have recently discussed as a great 
logician uses the same question to illustrate 
the pertinacity in error of a certain class of 
thinkers. It was he, in fact, who first directed 
my attention to the question.” 

He picked up the volume of Poe from the 
table and read: 

“ ‘Nothing is more difficult than to convince 
the merely general reader that the fact of sixes 
having been thrown twice in succession by a 
player at dice is good cause for betting the 
largest odds that sixes will not be thrown in 
a third attempt. A suggestion to this effect 
is usually rejected by the intellect at once. It 
does not appear that the two throws which 
have been completed and which now lie ab- 
solutely in the past, can have influence on the 
throw which exists only in the future. The 
chances for throwing sixes seems to be pre- 
cisely as they were at any ordinary time; that 
is to say, subject only to the influence of the 
various other throws which may be made by 
the dice* And this is a reflection which appears 
so exceedingly obvious that attempts to con- 
trovert it are received more frequently with a 
derisive smile than with anything like respect- 
ful attention. The error here involved, a gross 
error redolent with mischief, I cannot pretend 
to expose within the limits assigned to me at 


158 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


present. With the philosophical it needs no ex- 
posure. It forms one of an infinite series of 
mistakes which arise in the path of reason 
through her propensity for seeking the truth 
in detail/ ” 

Harrison laid the book aside, and concluded : 
“Now, I think I have proved that a logical con- 
clusion is sometimes rather illogical.” 

“I wish I could have your assistance on this 
deal. It would be a grand game to check-mate 
him.” 

“That is impossible,” Harrison said. “I am 
away from speculation forever, it has no at- 
traction for me. Our discussion leads up to 
one point, however, the man who plays the 
deepest game wins ; and in the world of 
haute finance, he must needs play very deep 
sometimes.” 

Douglass picked up the paper, read some 
passages from the market news aloud, and com- 
mented on them, then he handed the paper to 
Harrison. He took it, and as his eyes fell on 
Bruce’s face, he gave a start of surprise. 

“Is this the man you are to campaign 
against?” he asked. 

“Yes; do you know him?” 

“No,” Harrison answered slowly, “no, I do 
not know him,” and made no further comment. 


CHAPTER XVII. 


The Mother's Blood. 

It was on the first day that Douglass was out of 
bed that George returned. He came in late in the 
afternoon; his clothes were in tatters, his face 
haggard, his frame emaciated, and his whole 
aspect that of a man who has undergone severe 
privations and hardships. They all looked at 
him aghast as he walked into the cabin and 
hung his rifle on the hook. He turned and 
spoke briefly. 

“I have been lost in the woods.” Then to 
Mary, “Will you please give me something to 
eat ?” 

She hastened to set food before him, and he 
ate ravenously. The men forebore to question 
him till he had finished eating. Even then Har- 
rison said very little, looking at the half-breed 
shrewdly as he told his story. 

He had gone for a deer, and finding the sign, 
had followed it into the woods, and had been 
lost. He had wandered about trying to find a 
trail, but had only gone deeper into the forest. 
At last, he got his bearings, and found his way 
back. As he returned very brief replies to all 
the inquiries, Douglass felt that he was em- 
barrassed over the apparent reflection on his 
woodcraft, and let the matter rest. 


159 


160 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


George soon left the cabin, and outside, threw 
himself upon the ground and slept the sleep of 
utter exhaustion. 

A little later Harrison came upon him as he 
lay there asleep, and stood looking down into 
his face. It was a contented face, worn and 
haggard as it was, and it was the face of an 
Indian. 

“The Mother’s blood,” Harrison said softly to 
himself, and walked away. 

****** 

Harrison told Douglass that night that he 
would prepare to return to his own cabin the 
next day. 

“You have George with you now, and you 
will be as well as ever in a short time,” he said. 

“Yes, as much as I regret to see you go, I 
know that you have already sacrificed your own 
comfort for me. I hope our next meeting will 
be under more favorable circumstances.” 

“I trust it will be. I am glad we were able 
to reach you in time. You will stop with us a 
few days on your way out?” 

“Yes, I had intended inviting myself.” 

“I have been reflecting on the matter of which 
we spoke the other night, and have decided to 
help you in your campaign against Bruce ; that 
is, if you are still of the same mind.” Then 
noting the look of surprise on Douglass’ face, 


THE MOTHER’S BLOOD 


161 


he continued : “I have reasons for my change of 
attitude. I may disclose them to you some day ; 
for the present I prefer to keep them to my- 
self. I will take these papers with me and 
study the matter in detail. Then when you 
stop with us we will compare notes and see if 
we can formulate a plan to outwit him.” 

Douglass accepted the offer unconditionally. 
He was, in truth, surprised, as Harrison was 
not a man to change his mind without good 
reason. But he asked no questions. He was 
very glad that Harrison was to lend his assist- 
ance, as he had grown to have great respect 
for his powers.” 

At the beach the next morning, Douglass 
bade them adieu with a heavy heart. They 
were his best, his only friends. He wrung 
Harrison’s hand and said, “I’m not going to try 
to tell you both how grateful I am — I could 
never do it.” 

Then he turned to Mary, and taking both 
her hands, said : 

“Lady Mary, I’m afraid I brought you. the 
first trouble you ever knew, and I’m sorry for 
that, but for all your loving kindness, you will 
have, always, my deepest gratitude and my dear- 
est love.” 

She said in a low voice that she was glad she 
could help him, and very, very glad that he was 
well again ; and they left him. 


162 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


At the entrance to the portage they turned 
and waved their hands to him, and he remem- 
bered that she had made him that same gesture 
of farewell a few weeks before, and thinking of 
that other parting, and all the things which had 
occurred in that brief period, he realized, with 
a pang, that this time she had not offered him 
her innocent face to kiss. 

* * * * * * 

In the succeeding winter, one day, a half 
dozen rough men were standing about the 
stove in the Manitowish store listening to a 
harrowing tale told by one of their number. 

“Yes, gents/’ he said, “I’ve been in these 
here woods a many a day, an’ naturally I’ve 
seen queer things, an’ fur as that goes, I’ve 
seen dead men in the timber before, but this 
here deceased I’m tellin’ you about kinder rat- 
tled me. I come on him onexpected, an’ of 
course that stops you pretty short; but that 
aint all; as I said, I’ve seen dead men before, 
but this here deceased ” 

“Well, what about him?” one of the listeners 
asked impatiently 

“Why, gents,” said the woodsman, rubbing 
his hand slowly over his stubby chin, “believe it 
or not, this here particular deceased had been 
scalped.” 


CHAPTER XVIII. 


The King Holds Council With Himself. 

“It is now three months since I left Chicago 
to recuperate my shattered health and learn 
to quit drinking too much whiskey ; I expected 
to be bored to death, but I haven’t been, and I 
guess everything that has happened to me has 
been for the best. 

“I’ve made two or three friends, the dearest 
I ever had. Even this half-breed is more to 
me than any one back there in the world I left. 
Eve lived and had new experiences and taken 
an interest in everything and learned a lot; 
particularly that money isn’t everything, — that 
it isn’t even much of anything. I’ve been shot, 
it’s true, but that don’t matter, and I’ve fallen 
in love, and that matters a great deal. 

“Yes, that’s the worst part of it, — the only 
bad part of it, and yet, if I could cancel that 
hopeless love by the expression of a word, I 
don’t think I’d do it. 

“I’ve always believed that love was a good 
deal of a phantasy, a thing for poets to write 
about and dreamers to dream about. I’ve ana- 
lyzed the grand passion in my philosophical 
moods, and always wound up by deciding that 


163 


164 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


it was moonshine, or money, or something 
worse, and now all my sophistry has fallen in 
a wreck about me, — I’m in love. Real love, 
pure love, honorable love, hopeless love. 

“Yes, I love her, soul and body. I love her 
clean mind and her honest heart, her pure in- 
nocence and her unselfish nature. And I love 
her hair and her eyes and her lips, and the 
shoes upon her little feet, and the belt around 
her waist. If I could throw away the world 
and all ambition, enterprise or wealth, and 
have her for my very own, I would give them 
up willingly, eagerly. 

“I suppose if I was to stay here, or better 
still, come back again, and use the wiles I’ve 
learned out in the world, I might erect in her 
young heart an effigy of love, I might win her. 
I might even make her happy by concealing 
from her the knowledge of what ;the heart can 
really feel. 

“But that would never do. I wouldn’t rob 
her that way, and, anyhow, it would be dead 
sea fruit for me, perhaps for both. 

“I’m not an old man yet, and if the disparity 
of years was all that lay between us, the chasm 
might be bridged. If her young heart had gone 
out to me as mine has to her, I don’t believe 
that would mean very much to either of us. But 
it didn’t, and there’s an end of it. She looks 
upon me as a friend, and for the rest, her own 


KING HOLDS COUNCIL WITH HIMSELF 165 


lips framed the words, — ‘I did it as I would 
have done it for my Father/ 

“I am not quite clear why her manner 
changed after the others came; it was a slight 
change, but I could see it. I wonder if she was 
woman enough and wise enough to read the 
secret in my eyes as I lay there, and, seeing it, 
was woman enough and wise enough to set me 
in my place gently, delicately. Well, no mat- 
ter, if she has guessed, it can’t be helped ; if 
not, she will never know that my heart is yearn- 
ing, breaking, crying out for her, the one, only 
one. 

“That’s all there is to it. I’ve gone the pace 
as hard as most men; if there’s anything bad 
in the world I haven’t done, it’s because I 
didn’t have the chance, or because I overlooked 
something. But in this one thing, I’m going 
to play fair. She shall never know. 

“And because I want to make it as easy for 
myself as I can, I’m going to run away. I’m 
going back among those slow-moving men 
with the pitiless hearts and greedy hands, and 
play the game of dollars again. I don’t know 
whether I’ll ever let whiskey get the better of 
me again or not. I don’t care anything about 
Bruce, I don’t cate about anything but her, but 
I will entertain myself, and maybe him for 
awhile. It will be a diversion to make him sit 
up and look around, and if I make money, I’ll 


166 THE KING OF NOBODYS ISLAND 


get what pleasure I can out of it, and if I lose, 
it can go and be damned to it. 

“But no matter what comes to me, nor what 
goes from me, no matter what my life may be, 
I’ll always hold her pure image in my heart. 
No matter where life’s vicissitudes may lead 
me, I will say ‘God bless her’ every niglit when 
I lie down to sleep, and no one, she least of 
all, will ever know that a heavy penalty has 
been exacted for my years of scoffing and sac- 
rilege.” 

And having said these things to himself, the 
King of Nobody’s Island rose from his chair, 
knocked the cold ashes from his pipe, heaved 
a sigh or two, and went to bed. 


CHAPTER XIX. 


Two Old Gray Rats. 

Bruce sat in his office in the Chicago Board 
of Trade, absorbed in the intricacies of a 
wilderness of figures. The perusal seemed to 
be satisfactory, and having completed it, he 
turned to his partner, another heavy, hard- 
faced man who sat cracking his knuckles and 
staring out the window. 

“Curtis,” Bruce said, “did you settle with 
Floyd today?” 

Curtis did not answer at once. He always 
studied his replies to see if he could not find 
something disappointing to say. He was al- 
ways looking on the dark side of things, and 
always making money. 

“No,” he said at length, “I didn’t settle with 
him.” 

“Well, he’ll settle in the open market to- 
morrow then. That is, he’ll buy his short 
wheat. What was the matter with him?” 

“He said he wouldn’t pay 90 cents for his 
line, thought it would go lower.” 

Bruce grinned. “He’ll pay 95,” he said, “and 
that will break him.” 

“He said,” Curtis continued, “that he had in- 
volved every thing he had, and that on the last 


167 


168 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


call for margins, he mortgaged his home, and 
that his wife was nearly crazy, and that he just 
couldn’t give up while there was a chance. He 
wanted me to let him out at 85, what do you 
think of that?” 

“What did you tell him?” 

“I told him we weren’t running an eleemo- 
synary institution.” 

Bruce grinned again. “That’s a good word, 
that ought to have fixed him. What about 
Campbell?” 

“He settled.” 

“Well, we won’t let any more of them set- 
tle. Let them buy • their wheat in the open 
market.” 

“We don’t want any failures, nor runaway 
markets,” Curtis said; “too much selling in 
the Northwest on these bulges, and too much 
public opinion when a man busts.” 

“So far as the cash wheat in the Northwest 
is concerned,” Bruce replied, “we’ve got to 
expect that, and may as well take it now as at 
higher prices. Every one thinks we’ll run a 
corner, but when September comes I won’t 
have a bushel of wheat. No corner for me.” 

“Nor for me either. I’ve been around this 
Board for twenty years and never saw but one 
corner successful. How’s your friend Doug- 
lass getting on?” 


TWO OLD GRAY RATS 


169 


“Mr. Douglass,” said Bruce, “has just about 
as much intelligence as I gave him credit for 
when I met him in New York. I seldom make 
a mistake in my judgment of a man. I have 
been on the lookout for him ever since I came 
here to run this deal. I naturally inferred that 
he would think he had me at a disadvantage 
because I was in Chicago playing his old game, 
and would take a crack at me. And so it turns 
out. He is here with an elaborate scheme to 
deceive me and make me think he is buying 
wheat. He argues that if I find him on the 
same side of the market as I am, I will shake 
him out. So he carefully sells twice as much 
wheat as he buys. He puts the transactions 
he wishes to conceal in the names of his lieu- 
tenants, and makes his purchases openly. Even 
if I did not know exactly what he has done, I 
would have surmised it. That game might 
deceive some men, but not me.” 

“I saw him on the street today, he don’t look 
very happy,” Curtis said. 

“He has about three hundred thousand loss, 
and his bank balance is, um-um, let me see.” 
The manipulator rummaged about the desk 
and produced a slip of paper ; “His bank balance 
is just one hundred and ninety thousand. He 
has a line of three million short wheat, over 
and above his own purchases.” 


170 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


“Six or seven cents advance would put him 
out of business.” 

Bruce smiled grimly. “It would and will, I 
shall advance wheat to 97 cents for his special 
benefit.” 

“That will bring some selling from the cash 
wheat points.” 

“I know it, but, as I said, that contingency 
would have to be met anyway if we are to 
run this wheat higher. There are some specula- 
tive lines up there, too, in St. Paul and Duluth. 
After I get through with my friend Douglass 
I’ll give those northwestern gentlemen a little 
shaking up.” 

“You say he has three million bushels short?” 

Bruce took another memorandum from his 
desk, “Here it is,” he said; “he sold two mil- 
lion bushels around 82. This sale he made 
through a man named Matthews, a lawyer. 
They met in a North Side saloon two weeks 
ago, and the next day this Matthews began 
selling wheat, I had him investigated and find 
that he is an old friend of Douglass. Around 
83 he sold another two million through a doctor 
named Graves ; he called him in to attend him 
as a physician, and the next day Graves began 
selling wheat. I had Graves investigated, and 
find that he has been Douglass’ family physician 
for many years. All the time that this has been 
going on he has pretended to be bullish on 


TWO OLD GRAY RATS 


171 


wheat, and has given numerous orders on 
the buying side. All together, he has now 
about a million bought, and four million 
sold. His present loss is just a trifle under 
$300,000.” 

“You keep pretty close tab on him.” 

“Yes, I don’t know as it was really neces- 
sary, as I doubt whether his operations would 
have interfered with our campaign very much, 
but he made a boast a few months ago that he 
would be even with me ; and I think enough 
of the game to step cut of my way to show 
him how much he has under-valued my pers- 
picuity,” 

“Well,” said Curtis moodily, “it was a pretty 
slick scheme; anybody but you would have 
fallen into the trap.” 

Bruce smiled heavily: “He has never met a 
man, nor visited a place since I saw him on the 
street two weeks ago, but that I have known 
all that transpired. I have seen copies of every 
telegram that he has received; I know how 
much money he has in bank, and I know how 
much he gave Graves and Matthews to sell 
wheat with. He took elaborate precautions 
about the money, drew it out of the bank 
in cash, and put it in a safe deposit box 
for a day or two, then gave it to them in 
currency and they deposited it to their own 
credits. 


12 


172 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


He might have got some one else to do the 
selling, some one you couldn’t connect him 
with,” mused Curtis. 

“Men don’t trust any one but intimate 
friends with so much money and such a secret,” 
Bruce retorted. “Besides, if a large sum of 
money had been withdrawn from his bank ac- 
count, and had not shown up in the hands of 
some one I could connect with him, I would 
have scanned every new trader till I laid my 
finger on his operations. I can tell you within 
a hundred thousand bushels how every trader 
in the market stands. I know who is long and 
who is short, and if they know where we stand, 
I’m deceived. It wouldn’t matter anyway.” 

“When are you going after him?” Curtis 
asked. 

“This is Tuesday; wheat closed 904 today; 
I’ll put it to 92J tomorrow, then give him a 
chance to get his margins up, and put it to 
93 i- He can’t margin above 97, and Friday 
they’ll call him him three cents a bushel. He 
won’t have much left in his bank account Satur- 
day, for on Saturday wheat will close at 97.” 

“You won’t let him bust on us ! That would 
be a bad thing, I’m afraid, with as big a line 
as his.” 

“I’ve thought of all that,” Bruce said shortly. 
“I’ll call him into the office Saturday afternoon 
and tell him how much wheat he’s got, and 


TWO OLD GRAY RATS 


173 


how much money he’s got, and let him settle 
at 97 cents.” 

The old man’s eyes glowered, and he struck 
his knee softly but meaningly with his clenched 
fist: “He goes away from here, to God knows 
where, to rest, and while he’s resting he hatches 
up a great scheme to beat me at my own game. 
He thinks he has concealed his operations from 
me. I’ll have the pleasure of showing him that 
I know more about him than he knows about 
himself.” Curtis sighed. “Oh, well, we’ll get 
him all right; I hope we get ’em all .” Then 
he sighed again, and took his leave for the day. 

As Curtis left the office, a little ferret-eyed 
man entered, and stood silently and respect- 
fully near the door. Bruce beckoned him to 
approach, and he came up and handed him some 
folded, typewritten sheets. 

“Where is he now, Sanders?” Bruce asked. 

“Gone to his room; sitting there reading. 
I’ve got a man on the outside, and his own 
servant, you know, is one of us.” 

“All right, that’s all.” 

The man withdrew, and Bruce scanned the 
typewritten pages. They contained a report of 
every movement Douglass had made during 
the day and the preceding evening. When he 
had examined them, Bruce folded them care- 
fully and placed them in his desk. 


174 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


“That’s all well enough,” he said to himself, 
“but it’s only a confirmation of what I 
already knew. Mr. Douglass don’t seem 
to understand that the really shrewd man works 
more on what his reason tells him than on 
what he is able to discover.” 


CHAPTER XX. 


The Game. 

Douglass walked slowly along La Salle 
Street, lost in thought, paying no heed to the 
busy throng that surged by him. He had made 
an engagement to meet Matthews in an obscure 
restaurant on the North Side for the purpose 
of giving him more money to deposit as margin 
on the wheat he had sold through him. It was 
Friday afternoon, and wheat had advanced that 
day to 94 cents. He knew that the brokers who 
had sold the wheat for Matthews and Dr. 
Graves would be clamoring for more margins, 
and he carried the money in his pocket to 
supply them. 

Strange as it may appear, his thoughts were 
not occupied with his transactions, nor his 
financial condition. He was thinking of No- 
body’s Island, and the clear air of the woods, 
and of Lady Mary. He had only been away 
from them a few weeks, but the whole experi- 
ence seemed like a dream now. How much it 
had changed his heart and his mind, he alone 
knew. “After a man gets used to the woods 
and the, hills,” Kaufman had said, “they’re 
always calling to him when he goes away.” It 
was true, — they were calling to him already. 


175 


176 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


He stopped once on his way to the appointed 
meeting place and took a drink of whiskey. 
He did not drink much as yet, but he knew that 
the old habit was slowly coming back. He 
made no effort to combat it. His appetite was 
still good, but he knew it would not be long till 
he reached the old basis. 

At the meeting place he found Matthews 
awaiting him. The lawyer’s face was troubled, 
and he looked haggard, as one who has need of 
sleep. “Doug,” he said when they had seated 
themselves, “I’m in this thing with you, and 
I'll go through with it, but I wouldn’t be a 
financier again for anything in the world. I’m 
not built for it.” 

Douglass laughed. “It’s an old game with 
me,” he said. “How much did they call you 
for?” 

“Sixty thousand dollars. That fellow has 
been at me three times since two o’clock.” 

Douglass took a roll of money from his 
pocket and counted out the amount in thou- 
sand-dollar bills. 

“Inconvenient way to handle it,” he said, 
“but I’ve got to conceal things.” 

Matthews pocketed the money, and shifted 
nervously in his chair. 

“I don’t want to worry you, Doug, but I 
must tell you that I’ve got a suspicion I’m be- 
ing followed. Of course, I may be mistaken, 


THE GAME 


177 


but I’ve seen the same man too often of late. 
This thing means so much to you, don’t you 
think it possible that your opponent is on to 
your game?” 

“No,” Douglass said, “I’ve used every pos- 
sible precaution. You and I have never been 
actually seen together since I returned. He 
can’t find out everything.” 

“Well, I hope you’re right, but I’m worried 
as much as if the money was my own.” 

Douglass laid his hand affectionately on his 
friend’s shoulder. “Don’t you worry, Billy. If 
it don’t pan out, it’s all right. It’s a good game 
anyway. I think it will be ended one way or 
the other tomorrow.” 

“I hope it comes your way, but I’m dubious, 
some way. But of course I don’t understand 
it.” 

“All right, Billy, we’ll see. I’m going to cut 
this visit short, I’ve got another man to see. 
After it’s all over I’ll describe the whole situa- 
tion to you.” 

Douglass took his leave, and Matthews re- 
mained in the private room for half an hour. He 
looked around suspiciously when he came out, 
but there was no sign of the man he suspected 
of shadowing him. With a feeling of relief he 
made his way to his office. 

Douglass returned to his apartments; and 
shortly after his arrival, Dr. Graves drove up. 


178 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


He alighted from his stanhope with his satchel 
in hand, and went to Douglass’ room. 

A transaction similar to that with Matthews 
took place. Graves was not nervous ; he knew 
the way such men as Douglass gambled, and 
made no comment. He asked a few questions 
as to what should be said to the broker who 
had been importuning him to reduce his large 
line of wheat. 

'‘Don’t you pay any attention to him,” Doug- 
lass replied. “Tell him you know what you’re 
doing.” 

“Which I don’t,” Graves interpolated. 

“It looks to a man up a tree as if I didn’t 
either,” Douglass said with a laugh. 

“Now, I’ve got something unpleasant to say, 
John,” Graves went on ; “I’ve half a notion I’m 
being watched. There has been a little sharp- 
eyed rascal in a cab at my heels three or four 
times of late. It may be a coincidence, but it 
don’t look right. I thought I ought to tell 
you.” 

“That’s bad ; Matthews said the same thing.” 

“Does your success depend on the effectual 
concealment of your plan?” 

“Not absolutely, but pretty nearly so. There 
are some things I wanted him to know, so he 
would figure wrong on my position. It wouldn’t 
do for him to know too much. I would have 
diversified this line more, but you and Billy 


THE GAME 


179 


were the only ones I could trust absolutely with 
the secret and the money.” 

“From what I can gather by the newspapers, 
this Bruce could easily put the price higher if 
he wanted to.” 

“Yes, he has the situation well in hand: 
Bruce is the market, he can juggle it around 
as he likes, but sometimes that kind of business 
is expensive. If he should run wheat to a dol- 
lar, for instance, there would be a lot of selling, 
and if he was to keep the price at one dollar, 
he’d have to take about all that was offered at 
that figure. He’s had to do some pretty big 
buying today to put the price up.” 

“Well, I hope you’ll come out all right. Don’t 
dwell too much on what I said about being 
followed ; it may be a mare’s nest.” 

“All right,” Douglass said, as he bade the 
old man good-day, “I won’t worry about it.” 

After Dr. Graves had gone, he went to the 
buffet and helped himself to a drink. Then he 
sat down at the table and filled a sheet with 
figures. When he had completed his calcula- 
tions, he drummed idly on the table with his 
fingers for a time, and his eyes began to take 
on a sorrowful, far-away look. Then he recalled 
himself sharply, and took up the memorandum 
again, saying half aloud: “I’ve got just $8,000 
in the bank, and I’m margined to 97 cents. I 
wonder how much the old fox knows.” 


CHAPTER XXI. 


Dog Eat Dog Again. 

Bruce had stated that he would carry the 
price of wheat to 97 cents on Saturday ; he kept 
his word, he had been compelled to buy more 
wheat than he really wanted at such high 
prices, but he was a stubborn man at times, 
and in this instance he had determined to make 
an end of Douglass once and for all. 

After he had finished the routine work of the 
day, he sat thinking for a while, then in his 
small, crabbed chirography, indited a note to 
Douglass asking him to call at his office at 
seven o’clock that evening. He made the hour 
late because he wished to be alone and undis- 
turbed. He had suffered some inconvenience 
and monetary loss in his campaign against 
Douglass, and he wanted to gloat over him 
quietly. 

When Douglass received the missive, he 
flushed a little and tore the note slowly to- 
pieces, but after a little reflection, penned an 
answer in which he agreed to be on hand at the 
appointed time. Bruce read the answer with a 
grim smile, and handed it to Curtis. 

“He’s not so independent when he’s broke,” 
he said. 


180 


DOG EAT DOG AGAIN 


181 


“No, it takes the starch out of a man to lose 
his money,” Curtis replied. “Never saw a man 
yet that wouldn’t kneel down when his pockets 
were empty.” 

****** 

At seven o’clock Douglass walked into 
Bruce’s private office and seated himself. The 
scene reminded him of that day he had called 
on him in New York. The manipulator did not 
turn nor notice him in any way, but went on 
with his work. Douglass reflected that the 
man was not very versatile; he had the same 
insolent way with him now as before. But he 
sat patiently waiting for him to finish, and 
meanwhile studied the man’s face curiously. 

Bruce turned to him at length and eyed him 
coldly. 

“I sent for you, Mr. Douglass,” he said, “to 
give you a chance to settle on that line of 
short wheat you have.” 

Douglass answered without any change in his 
calm face, but his words were hard and cold : 

“Since when, Mr. Bruce, did you take charge 
of my business?” 

“It is my business now,” Bruce answered, 
with no show of anger. “You are in a position 
where you cannot margin your trades, and that 
means that on Monday three million bushels of 
wheat will be bought in the open market for 


182 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


your account. I could sell it to you then if I 
chose, or I could make you pay a dollar for it, 
and you would be bankrupt.” 

“And you don’t want a runaway market, nor 
you don’t want to appear as a seller of wheat,” 
Douglass said. 

“That is exactly the case; I am doing you a 
kindness, and protecting myself at the same 
time. No use multiplying words about it, you 
know the situation as well as I do. If you 
don’t want to buy the wheat of me at 97, you 
can buy it Monday in the open market.” 

“It seems to me that I ought to know the 
situation a little better than you do.” 

“Well, you don’t know it any better.” He 
took a sheet of figures from a pigeon-hole and 
laid them on the desk before him. 

“You have tonight two million bushels of 
wheat short through Rose & Co., in the name 
of William Matthews. You have an additional 
two million short through Kendall Bros., in the 
name of L. C. Graves. That makes four mil- 
lion bushels, and it averages you about 82J 
cents. You also have one million bushels 
bought in your own name at about 85. That 
leaves you three millions short.” 

“Well?” 

“Well,” Bruce said slowly, “you’ve got $8,000 
in bank to protect it with, and that won’t pro- 
tect it.” 


DOG EAT DOG AGAIN 


183 


“It seems to me you’re taking a good many 
liberties with my private affairs.” 

“Would you like to know why?” 

“Yes” 

“You came to me in New York a few months 
ago and accused me of bad faith in the deal in 
Rope,—” 

“Yes, and you didn’t deny it, you couldn’t; 
you simply said it was a game of dog eat dog.” 

“I’m not going over that ground again. At 
that time you threatened to be even with me. 
That was a weakness to begin with ; if you had 
kept still you might have done it, but I was on 
my guard. I saw you on the street two weeks 
ago, and I set about following your movements. 
You see how well I have done it.” 

“And you bid wheat up to 97 cents today for 
my special benefit?” 

“I don’t say I did or I didn’t! The market 
speaks for itself ; wheat closed at 97 cents.” 

“Well, is that all?” 

“That’s all. I may give you a word of ad- 
vice, however: The plan you laid to deceive me 
fell to the ground simply because you under- 
estimated my intelligence. The whole scheme 
was apparent to me at once. Before I ever set 
about finding out what you were doing and 
where you stood, I surmised your plan. Never 
make the mistake of thinking your opponent a 
fool, — unless he is. That’s all; do you want 


184 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


to take in your three million short wheat at 
97 or not?” 

“I have no short wheat,” Douglass answered 
coolly. 

Bruce sneered. “Your friends have, — it’s all 
the same thing.” 

“No, my friends haven’t. I’ve been long of 
wheat all the way up. I sold two million 
bushels of my long line today; you took it off 
my hands at 97 cents That cleans me up, I 
haven’t got a bushel of wheat one way or the 
other.” 

There was that in the voice and manner of 
Douglass which caused Bruce’s mind to misgive 
him. If this should be true, he had been fooled 
to the top of his bent. He concealed his ap- 
prehensions, however, and said shortly: 

“Very well, the interview is at an end,” and 
turned to his desk. 

“Oh no, it isn’t,” Douglass said fiercely. “It 
isn’t at an end by a damned sight, as you will 
soon find out. You got me up here to crow 
over me in that stagey way of yours ; I told you 
in New York that you were a play-actor. Well, 
I’ll have my say now. Never think your op- 
ponent is a fool, you say; that’s what you’ve 
been doing yourself, and I’ve made a monkey 
of you just as I promised I would. Everything 
you knew, everything you found out about my 
cffairs, I knew you would find out. I gauged 


DOG EAT DOG AGAIN 


185 


j'our intellect exactly. I was afraid sometimes 
your sleuths wouldn’t find out enough. I’ve 
been long of wheat all the way up through a 
friend in St. Paul; you’ve had a lot of trouble 
with him, and I’ve made a million dollars of 
your money. You find I am quits, Mr. Bruce!” 

Bruce knew it was the truth, knew he was 
beaten. His face, usually so expressionless, low- 
ered with anger and hatred, but he could find 
no words to fit the case. Like many another man 
in a similar situation, he had not the courage to 
acknowledge defeat, so he said in a tense voice: 

“Do you expect me to believe this magnifi- 
cent fairy story? I know you have that three 
million wheat short.” 

“Of course you do,” Douglass jeered, “and 
I’ve got three million long through your own 
brokers to offset it. The two transactions will 
be rung up against each other Monday.” 

“I’ll believe it when I see it.” 

“You’re going to see it right now,” Douglass 
answered, stepping to the door. He motioned 
to an occupant of the outer office, who entered 
quietly. It was Harrison. 

“Mr. Harrison,” Douglas said, “Mr. Bruce 
doubts, or pretends to doubt that I’ve got three 
million long wheat in St. Paul. Will you con- 
vince him?” 

Harrison drew some statements from his 
pocket and laid them on Bruce’s desk. 


186 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


“There are Mr. Douglass’ transactions,” he 
said. “I think you will find them correct.” 

Bruce glanced at them, and knew at once 
that what Douglass had told him was the truth. 
The mask dropped entirely now, and his face 
was distorted with anger. “I knew you didn’t 
have the wit to do it,” he said; “this man was 
your instructor.” 

Douglass laughed harshly. “Even so,” he 
said, “all honor where honor is due. We beat 
you at your own game, and that’s good enough 
for me.” 

Bruce turned to his desk again. “I’ll promise 
you you haven’t seen the end of me,” he mut- 
tered. 

“That’s a weakness, — never make threats,” 
Douglass quoted. 

“Before we leave you, Mr. Bruce,” Harrison 
said in his level voice, “I wish to explain my 
part in the matter.” 

Bruce whirled in his chair. He was con- 
sumed with anger, and this interloper, with his 
quiet air, maddened him more than Douglass 
with his open exultation. 

“I don’t care anything about you or your 
part in the matter,” he said savagely, “and I 
don’t want to hear any more from either of 
you.” 

“You are going to hear what I have to say 
whether you like it or not,” Harrison answered. 


DOG EAT DOG AGAIN 


187 


He did not stir nor raise his voice, but there 
was that in his eyes and tone which com- 
manded silence and respect. 

“I did not enter this campaign because I 
wanted your money nor because I wanted to 
outwit you ,” Harrison continued. “When Mr. 
Douglass first asked me to participate, I 
answered that I would not; but later I saw 
your picture in a newspaper he had, and recog- 
nized in you a man who had done a great wrong 
to one who was very dear to me. I had never 
seen you, but I had seen another picture of you, 
carried by a deceived and broken-hearted 
woman to her grave. It occurred to me that I 
could in some measure right the wrong, and 
incidentally keep the promise made many years 
ago. My proportion of the gain in this deal I 
shall turn over to the girl whose mother you 
robbed and deceived. As for the promise, I 
will keep it now. I had intended to seek you 
out at your home, but when I heard that 
you were to meet Mr. Douglass tonight, I 
decided that it was as well here as at another 
time and place.” 

He stepped to the door, and returned lead- 
ing Mary by the hand. The close-fitting tail- 
ored gown she wore made her appear taller and 
slighter, and her face was very pale. She 
did not tremble, but held Harrison’s hand 
tightly. 


13 


188 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


Douglass, watching Bruce narrowly, saw his 
face turn white, then ghastly gray, and his hands 
clutched convulsively at the arms of his chair. 
His lips moved a little, and although no sound 
was audible, it was plain that they formed the 
one word “Mary.” Harrison’s quiet voice broke 
the silence. 

“This is your daughter,” he said ; “she looks 
very like her mother.” 

Bruce made no answer, he looked only at 
Mary, and his face seemed very, very old. 

“After you had secured her mother’s for- 
tune, and trumped up your divorce,” Harrison 
continued, “she returned to her home, penniless, 
broken in mind and body. I sought her out and 
she begged me to take her away from the 
world ; she imagined you were always pursuing 
her. I married her to protect her name, — I was 
to have married her before you took her from 
me, by what devil’s art I do not know, — and 
took her to a quiet island in the woods. A few 
months later Mary was born, and in another 
month she was motherless. I promised my 
wife before she died that I would bring you face 
to face with her child. I have kept that prom- 
ise, and I have restored the fortune which was 
hers by right, and my business here is ended.” 

He turned to the door, but Bruce put out one 
trembling, bloodless hand and stayed them. 
Then he wet his dry lips with his tongue, and 
said hoarsely: 


DOG EAT DOG AGAIN 


189 


“I would like to tell the child that I am 
sorry, that I tried to find her mother and make 
reparation. I am an old man, and the world 
looks different to me now from what it did then. 
I cannot ask her to forgive me, but I would 
like her to know that I am sorry, and that I 
have suffered for my act.” 

“You have my forgiveness,” she answered in 
a low voice. “I wish I could couple with it 
some loving thought, but I can only think of 
you as a strange man who wronged my mother. 
My own father stands here beside me.” 

Turning to Harrison, she begged him to take 
her away, and they left Bruce sitting there sur- 
rounded by his books and figures, and went 
upon the street. There she turned again to 
her father, yes, her own father, and said to him 
in a subdued voice : 

“Please take me home, away from it all. I 
am very unhappy.” 

* * * * * * 

When the sun rose red over Lake Michigan 
on Sunday morning, and with his earliest rays 
lighted up the great, grey edifice at the foot of 
La Salle Street, and bathed those blood-soaked 
stones with light, the man of schemes and 
dollars was still sitting where they left him, and 
the pitiless fingers of remorse and hopeless 
yearning had drawn heavy lines upon his stony, 
aged face. 


CHAPTER XXII. 


The Messenger. 

Two months had passed; to Douglass they 
had been wearying and irksome. He had 
thought when he left Nobody’s Island that his 
absence from the old scenes would lend some 
new interest to his return, but he was mistaken. 
Something of new self-respect and pride had 
grown up in his heart, and he found that the 
fountains of pleasure were not only as unin- 
teresting and monotonous as of old, but that he 
looked upon them now with contempt and dis- 
gust. 

It was true even of the whiskey. He had 
assured himself that he would gradually drift 
into his old habits, and for a time he saw the 
confirmation of this view in an increase of the 
use of liquor. But later, when he arose with 
that heavy lifeless feeling he knew so well, and 
turned to the decanter for relief, a fierce feeling 
of shame came over him, — shame that he could 
be so weak and cowardly, and with that shame 
a keen remembrance of the happy days on No- 
body’s Island, and above all, a still small voice 
that bade him be more worthy of her even if 
she was lost to him forever. 


190 


THE MESSENGER 


191 


He was better for his sorrow. He had al- 
ways been a tolerant man, tolerant of others’ 
faults as well as his own, — and now bitterness 
and harsh judgment of other men was almost 
absent from his heart. His defeat of Bruce 
had been a keen satisfaction to him at the time, 
but sometimes as he thought of the gray-haired 
man with that cup of wormwood always at 
his lips, he felt a little pity even for him. 

He thought often of that triumphant day, 
but not of the victory he had gained over Bruce. 
His fortune had come back to him, his revenge 
had been glutted, but she had passed from his 
sight that same day, left him with but a brief 
adieu, never to gladden his eyes again, never 
any more. The victory of money and revenge 
was in one scale, Mary in the other, and for 
the satisfaction of that day, the balance swung 
heavily against him. 

But he was not a man to cry over spilt milk, 
nor to indulge in sickening self-pity. He went 
upon his way calmly as of yore, a little quieter, 
a little more thoughtful, and a great deal better. 

To amuse himself and defeat his great enemy, 
time, was now his chief pursuit* The taste of 
freedom and health he had had in the woods 
led him to project some new trip of the kind, 
and with this in view he went to Matthews’ 
office one day. 


192 THE KIND OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


“Billy,” he said, “I’ve never been able to set- 
tle with you for your part in that deal of mine, 
— you won’t take anything, — so I’ve figured out 
a plan.” 

“You know why I did it, Doug,” Matthews 
replied, “I wouldn’t have done the thing for 
many men, and by the great horn spoon I 
wouldn’t do it again, even for you. Too much 
money, too much money. You fellows see so 
much money in that game of yours that you 
lose all conception of its value. I didn’t sleep 
ior a week. But it was a beautiful deal all 
right.” 

“Yes, it turned out all right. But to get back 
to my plan. You’ve been drilling here for a 
year now without a vacation, and I want you 
to plan a trip for us to take somewhere to- 
gether, and let me foot the bills. I’m asking it 
as much for my sake as for yours. You got me 
started at this thing, and you’ve got to help 
me out.” 

Matthews considered for a time, then his 
face brightened. 

“There’s one trip I always did want to take, 
but it’s a long one, and the expense isn’t so 
great as the loss of time. I’ll think the matter 
over and let you know.” 

“You’re going to let me know right now.” 
Then laying his hand on Matthews’ knee, 
Douglass continued earnestly: 


THE MESSENGER 


193 


“See here, Billy, I’ve got money, a lot of it, 
and it’s not much good to me, — no good at all 
if I can’t give some of it to my friends, — what 
few I have, — and besides, I owe you something 
for your part in that deal. I want you to figure 
what your business is paying here, — what it 
would pay while you’re gone, and let me settle 
the score. You know the spirit in which I 
make the offer, and as sure as my name’s Doug- 
lass, I’ll walk out of this office and cut you 
dead if you don’t let me do it. It’s a pleasure 
to me, and it’s your due.” 

Matthews laughed at his friend’s earnestness. 
“Well, I suppose I’ll have to say yes,” he re- 
plied. “Perhaps when you hear me describe 
the trip you won’t be so keen for it.” 

“I’m game. Where will we go?” 

“The trip I have in mind is up in Montana, 
so we can’t go till next Spring. We will make 
a boat up there and put it into the Missouri 
River. The stream is swift and deep. We 
would have to carry the boat around the rapids 
at Great Falls, but after that we can go on 
as long as we please. It would be a 
grand trip, fine scenery and shooting all 
the way.” 

“By George, that’s a dandy scheme,” Doug- 
less said enthusiastically. “We can begin right 
now to plan and make our purchases. We’ll 


194 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


do it all ourselves, every lick of it. We won’t 
need a guide, — can’t get lost on a river. How 
far down can we come?” 

“Why, just as far as we like. We can leave 
the boat somewhere up in Dakota, or we can 
come clear to St. Louis.” 

“That’s the ticket, we’ll come to St. Louis. 
Got a map?” 

Matthews took a map from his desk. It was 
marked and crossed with red ink, showing that 
he had often figured out the voyage in his 
ieisure moments. 

“I’ve been on this trip about a hundred times 
in my mind,” Matthews said; “that’s the next 
best thing to going in reality. Here's Town- 
send,” he continued, “that’s where we’ll build 
our boat.” 

For several hours the two men sat planning 
and figuring like two enthusiastic school boys. 
One would suggest something, and that would 
remind the other of something else. And so, 
they passed a happy afternoon in the pleasures 
of planning and anticipation. 

Douglass returned to his apartments more 
contented than he had been for a long time. 
He was going to be busy. Even if the trip was 
a long way off, he could get some relief in 
planning for it with Matthews. His thoughts 
turned to his cabin up there in the woods, and 
he reflected with a sigh that if things were dif- 


THE MESSENGER 


195 


ferent, Matthews would enjoy a visit there as 
much as he would the projected trip. Nothing 
would ever quite equal that experience. 

His servant interrupted his reverie by bring- 
ing in his letters. Douglass glanced at the 
superscriptions, — he knew them all. One from 
Mrs. Calvert, who was forever trying to save 
his soul, and one from Mrs. Jordan, who wasn’t; 
a begging letter or two, and half a dozen notes 
from people who probably wanted tips on the 
market. He threw them all aside unopened, 
and turned inquiringly to his man, who was 
still standing before him. 

“There’s a man down in the office wants to 
see you. He has been here twice. I don’t 
think you’ll care to see him, but he would wait. 
I asked him for his card and he said he didn’t 
have one.” 

“What sort of a looking man?” Douglass 
asked indifferently. 

“Well, he looks to me like some kind of a 
foreigner. When I asked him for his card, he 
said to just tell you it was George.” 

Douglass sprang to his feet and rushed down 
to the office. There sat George, very ill at ease 
under the scrutiny of the clerk and the im- 
portant bell-boys. Douglass strode up to him 
with a hearty greeting and wrung his hand 
joyfully. 


196 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


“Why didn’t you tell me you were coming,” 
he cried, “so I could meet you. Come right 
up to my rooms.” 

“I’m not much on letter-writing,” George 
said as they made their way to Douglass’ apart- 
ments. “You know when you paid me off and 
left, I promised to come and see you. I never 
was in a big city before, and I had a time find- 
ing your place.” 

“Well, you’re here now, and you’re going to 
see all you want to. You’re looking fine.” 

“Thank you, sir. You don’t look as well as 
you did up in the woods,” replied George with 
admirable candor. 

“Oh, I’m all right. Sit down, sit down, and 
tell me all the news.” 

George looked at the chairs suspiciously; 
such things were not of his world. He chose 
the least elaborate, and seated himself gingerly 
upon its edge. He was dressed in a new black 
suit, and it sat illy upon his fine muscular body. 
He had also purchased a massive gold watch 
chain, and as he talked, he fumbled it un- 
easily. 

“Well, there ain’t much news to tell.” Then 
he brightened up : “Oh, yes, a bear climbed in 
through the window of the cabin and busted 
open the cupboard, and messed things up pretty 
bad. I was over to Harrison’s at the time and 
didn’t get him.” 


THE MESSENGER 


197 


Douglass received this important news with 
a shout of laughter. A moment later it struck 
him that he had not laughed that way since he 
left the woods. George laughed with him, and 
sat back farther in his chair, a little more at 
ease. 

“That friend of yours asked me for my 
card,” George continued, “and I guess he was 
kind o’ mad because I didn’t have any. He’s 
the first man I ever saw that I was afraid 
of — s’pose he’s all right when you know 
him.” 

Douglass repressed another laugh, and set 
about making George feel at home. It oc- 
curred to him that everything here impressed 
the halfbreed with much the same strange 
novelty as the scene of the woodland had first 
impressed him. George was as much a green- 
horn as he had been in the woods, and with a 
quick remembrance of how patient and pleasant 
the boy had been, he determined to repay him 
in kind. So he asked him what most in- 
terested him in the city, what he wanted to 
see, and where he wanted to go. 

“Well, I’ve seen about enough for one day,” 
George answered. “I’d like to see a theater, 
though.” 

“You’re going to see them all,” Douglass 
said heartily. “We’ll start going tonight. 
Which way did you come out?” 


198 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 


“Same way I took you in ; stopped at Kauf- 
man’s one day and night. He said to give you 
his regards.” 

“How are they all at Harrison’s?” 

“About the same. Mr. Harrison is building 
an ice-house. He wants everything that’s go- 
ing. Miss Mary don’t seem quite as gay as 
she used to.” 

“She hasn’t been ill, has she?” Douglass 
asked quickly. 

“Oh no, not to say sick, but she acts older, 
and don’t skip around quite as much as she 
used to.” 

Douglass remained silent; his thoughts were 
far away. 

George shifted uneasily in his chair, consid- 
ered for a moment, watching his companion’s 
face, cleared his throat and said: 

“She’s been different ever since you was shot. 
Sometimes I think it’s on account of some 
things you said to her when you were out of 
your head.” 

Douglass sprang to his feet, crossed the room 
in two steps, and caught George by the shoul- 
ders. 

“What did I say to her?” he asked in a tense 
voice. 

George was not astonished nor appalled by 
the action. He looked straight in the other’s 
eyes and answered : 


THE MESSENGER 


199 


“You told her you loved her, and she told 
you the same. And you went right ahead talk- 
ing, and she said some things to you. She told 
you she didn’t care anything about your being 
older, and some other things. That’s what I 
heard, and I left the room. You spoke naturally 
enough, and we didn’t either one of us know 
you was out of your head. And when she saw 
how it was, she made me promise not to tell, — 
but I’ve broke my word.” 


CHAPTER XXIII. 


The Home Trail, 

Along the trail that leads from Wild-Cat 
Lake to Harrison’s, a man was toiling. The 
trail was a bad one, and the canoe upon his 
head was heavy. Now and then he stumbled 
to his knees, or was thrown sharply back by 
a heavy overhanging branch, but he took up his 
way good-naturedly. Once when a root tripped 
him, and he stretched his length upon the 
ground he cursed softly as he arose, but there 
was no wrath in the malediction, and he 
laughed in almost the same breath. He did not 
sing as he strode along, he needed all his breath 
for his labor, but his heart was singing, and it 
was a good song, well sung, a song that his im- 
poverished youth had never known, the song of 
a bird that flies to meet its mate. 

****** 

It was evening when he came softly to the 
door of the cabin, — so softly that she did not 
hear him. She was sitting by the great table 
reading, and the subdued light of the lamp shed 
a lustre on her hair, and a glory on her face. 
He stepped inside, and she looked up quietly. 
Then her face grew white, and she rose slowly 


200 


THE HOME TRAIL 


201 


and came a step or two toward him, searching 
his face with wide, unbelieving eyes. Some- 
thing she saw there, and something in the mo- 
tion of his empty arms, changed the pallor of 
her cheeks to a rosy, glorious red, and in an- 
other instant her head was on his breast. 

* * * * * * 

When the night had fallen, the King of 
Nobody’s Island and his Queen to be, walked 
hand in hand upon the quiet beach. The King 
thought of many things ; of the struggling mob 
he had left behind him, of the lost years of 
striving, fighting, chasing those will-o-the- 
wisps of gain and pleasure; and lastly, with a 
thankful heart, of the one of all the world who 
had given herself into his keeping, and he 
vowed that he would guard his treasure care- 
fully, honorably, nobly, as befitted a King. 

And the Queen, — it is not given to us to 
know what she thought, for the depths of a 
woman’s heart and love, limitless, fathomless, 
— no man has ever sounded. She only asked 
the old questions that women always ask of 
the men they love; but in her eyes, lately so 
sorrowful, a great light was shining, a light that 
was reflected from the eyes of her King. 

And if you want to know what the things 
were which she asked him, or what brought the 
light into her eyes, you must find Kings or 


202 THE KING OF NOBODY’S ISLAND 

Queens of your very own, and hear from their 
lips the words that men and maids said to each 
other in the earliest days of creation, and which 
they will be saying to each other long after you 
and I are dust. 


[the end] 




























































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